Don't Stop Here
by imaginarybird
Summary: Lucas speaks up and says exactly what his feelings are in Texas. This changes things. A lot. Rucas. Complete.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I don't own GMW. My use of the characters is just for fun.

Notes: This fic would not have developed properly without the help of shipperluv over on tumblr who was an excellent sounding board/helper during the early stages when I was feeling completely stuck. Thanks so much!

We're starting at the campfire scene in Texas pt. 2, and things take a turn from there.

* * *

" _What if that's not what I think we are?"_

" _Well, then you better start thinking of us like that."_

Lucas still can't believe what Riley's saying. He didn't believe it in Pappy Joe's living room and he doesn't believe it now. There's just no way that the relationship they have is the same as something between a brother and sister. You don't stare at your sibling and share secret smiles. You don't get jealous when someone else asks your sibling out.

You don't kiss your sibling.

But Riley keeps saying she loves him like a brother. She tries calling him nicknames that sound foreign coming out of her mouth. She punches his arm and keeps saying that things are easier now because this is how they're supposed to be.

Nothing about this feels easy to Lucas. One minute he's riding high on his victory with Tombstone, excited to go out and celebrate with his friends and thinking that maybe if his luck continues and the night goes well he'll get to dance with Riley or step outside with her for a quiet talk, the next...the girl he was ready to step up and ask out and try the dating thing with again is telling him that they're better as brother and sister and that's how she loves him. They do dance, but it's just a line dance. And whenever he tries to talk to her to get her to explain where this is coming from, he gets the same answers. What they have is great, she doesn't ever want to lose it, they're brother and sister.

Then they're at the fire and she's telling him that Maya likes him. As if that's supposed to make things better. The girl he thought he had something with is saying that it's not what he thought, but he's supposed to be OK with it because one of his other friends likes him that way.

Well Lucas isn't OK with it.

He's not. It's not fair that Riley gets to drop these bombs on him and just walk away. She gets to walk away like there was nothing between them and it's easy for her, but he can't even follow her and try to talk things through to get real answers because now Maya's involved too. He can't just leave her alone at the fire pit when it looks like she's had the rug pulled out from under her as much as he's had it pulled from under him.

And he can't leave her alone now that there's this _thing_ hanging in the air between them. He can't let things fester and get uncomfortable and leave things unresolved just because it might be awkward and hard to deal with. Lucas doesn't want to be that guy.

"So..." He drags out the word, falling back down onto his log. "What just happened?"

Maya exhales heavily. "Good freakin' question."

It would be nice if Maya could give him an actual answer. She's been quiet pretty much since the rodeo and it's getting a little old. Particularly now that she's actually involved. "Was she telling the truth?"

"About the brother thing? I guess so...She didn't really talk to me about it."

"What about the you thing?"

Maya doesn't answer him.

"Do you have feelings for me?"

She still says nothing. She won't even look in his direction. Instead she just stares resolutely into the fire, and it's really hard to control his frustration. How is he supposed to resolve the situation if _no one_ will talk to him about it?

"Maya." Lucas does everything he can to reign it all in, but her name still comes out louder and tenser than he would like. "Say something."

"What am I supposed to say?"

"How about an answer? Do you like me?"

Maya huffs out half a laugh, a bitter smile on her face. "Does it matter?"

Her question doesn't make much sense to him. Everyone's feelings matter, that's part of what makes this hard; it seems like no matter what they end up doing or saying, _someone_ is going to get hurt. "Of course it matt-,"

"We can all see how you've been looking at her, Huckleberry. We all heard what you said." Maya cuts him off, rolling her eyes. "Does it really matter to you if _I_ like you?"

"Everyone's feelings matter, Maya." He repeats. Lucas is going to leave it there, but she doesn't come any closer to giving him an answer and another thread holding back his frustration snaps. If everyone's feelings matter then his do too, and if Maya's not gonna talk about hers that doesn't mean he can't tell her his. He doesn't want to hurt her, but he also doesn't want to let all of this go on any longer than it needs to. And whatever her feelings might be, or whatever Riley's feelings might be, if he leaves his feelings in question with either of them things will only stay complicated. "If you really don't want to talk about your feelings then that's fine, but here's the thing. I'm OK talking about mine. And mine haven't changed.

"You're a great girl, Maya. One of my best friends. And I'm not saying that your feelings don't matter but...I don't see you as anything other than a friend. And if I've ever given you the impression that I do, I'm sorry but for me it's-,"

"Always been Riley." Maya finishes for him. "Yeah, I know."

A heavy silence falls over them. They both stare into the campfire. Lucas doesn't want to say anything else and make things more awkward. When about half a minute has passed and he risks a glance in her direction, Maya's head is bowed and she's picking at her fingernails. She's upset and it feels like it's his fault.

Never mind that it would only be worse if he had stayed silent and let her think that maybe things could work. Or that he tried to be as gentle as possible. Right now he's pretty sure that he's the guy who broke his friend's heart and there's nothing he could say that would make _that_ feel any better.

It startles him when Maya speaks, that same bitter smile in her voice. "You know what the worst part about this is?" She doesn't leave him any time to answer. "Everything's gonna change."

Lucas wants to tell her that it doesn't have to, but that would be a lie. Because it already has. It was never quiet between him and Maya, but it is now. It was never one-sided between him and Riley, but it is now. Riley never just did things without warning, but she has now. Things are already changing, and Maya's probably right to be worried about it. Before he can come up with a good answer, Maya is standing.

"I'm gonna head back to the house." She sighs, and then turns around, looking down at him. "I think you can handle putting out the fire."

If he didn't feel bad about his honesty before, Lucas certainly does as she walks the trail towards the house, leaving him alone. Her comment is like a sucker punch to his gut; even though she had never given him a straight answer about her feelings, those words make them seem evident enough, and he gets to be the one that took that away from her.

He won't apologize for not liking her like that, but he hates that he was put in the position where he had to hurt his friend just to be honest with her. A tiny part of him is mad at Riley for putting him in that position, because things were fine before she decided that everything needed to change. It's enough that as much as he wants to talk to her and figure out what exactly is going through her head and if this is _really_ the way things are going to be now, he can't bring himself to get up.

Lucas stays at the fire pit well into the night, until it burns down to it's embers.

* * *

" _I love you Lucas. And now I know how."_

Riley's words have been replaying in her brain all night. The lies swirl around in a twisted, mocking echo, internally telling her how horrible she is and it's only a matter of time until she's exposed. The truths are more of a cold vise-grip on her entire chest. Because now they don't matter.

Now Lucas is going to be with Maya, and he thinks she loves him like a brother. And even if he finds out the truth, even if he finds out that she was lying about the brother thing and actually _love_ loves him, he and Maya will already have found their happiness together (just like Maya deserves) and it will be too late; even if it's not too late and her friends haven't quite worked out the relationship thing yet, it won't change anything because who would want to be with someone who could lie like that?

No, Riley is certain that no matter what happens, whatever there was between her and Lucas is over and done with now.

The very thought makes her stomach hurt and her heart sink, even though it was her decision to begin with. She just couldn't bear the thought of losing Lucas entirely (and she knows if they got together and things didn't work that would happen) and then when she realized that Maya had been hiding her own feelings for Lucas to give her a chance at happiness...well that was the only sign that Riley needed. Maya deserves to be happy too and if Lucas is the person who can make her happy, who is Riley to stand in the way? Ending things with Lucas is doing the right thing for everyone—no matter how much it hurts her at the moment.

She goes to get ice cream with Farkle to distract herself and drown her sorrows in several scoops of cookie dough ice cream, but it doesn't turn out to be the best plan. The little ice cream shop appears to be the popular date spot for kids their age so in addition to watching Zay and Vanessa kindle their new thing over a shared sundae, Riley can't look towards any corner without spotting another happy couple. Then Farkle decides that he's not that full from his massive intake of cow and wants to have a go at the shop's sundae challenge, and he starts to devour a positively monstrous bowl of ice cream; what little appetite she had upon her arrival at the shop vanishes when she sees all of that.

Riley begs off early and walks back to Pappy Joe's, figuring at least she'll get to wallow in the privacy of the guest room and hopefully be asleep before Maya gets back. Then she'll have the energy to be happy for her in the morning and maybe things will be less painful.

Only Maya is already in the guest room when she gets back, lying on her side facing away from the door.

Riley frowns. "Maya?" She probes, kicking off her boots as she steps into the room. "Do you feel OK? I thought you would still be at the fire with Lucas."

"Well, you thought wrong." Maya has to clear her throat to get rid of the wet thickness in her voice and starts to shift on the bed. She sits up but doesn't turn around. "There's nothing for me out there."

"Don't be silly." Riley shakes her head as she walks around to the other side of the room. This doesn't make sense. Lucas was supposed to realize that now that she was out of the equation he could embrace the feelings he had for Maya. Obviously that hadn't happened. Maya's eyes are red and watery and she's not the type to cry happy tears. "Lucas is still out there, isn't he?"

"He is. But he doesn't want me. He wants you."

The words slam into Riley and she practically falls down to sit on the bed next to her friend. This is wrong. It's not what's supposed to happen. "You must have heard him wrong."

Maya shakes her head, fiddling with her hands. "No, he was pretty clear. He only likes me as a friend. You're the girl he wants to be with."

"Then he must have heard me wrong." Riley starts to stand. Fixing this for Maya is the only way she's not going to give in to the head-spinning panic that the news is inducing, and if that means she'll have to give Lucas the speech _again,_ she will. No matter how it feels. "I'll go and talk to-,"

"No!" Maya jumps to her feet and grabs Riley's arm to stop her with such force that Riley falls back onto the bed. "God, Riley, just stop! This whole thing happened because you couldn't keep your mouth shut. I was fine. Things were fine. But you had to get all _Riley_ about it and try to fix things that didn't need fixing and now instead of quietly dealing with it on my own, _everyone_ knows and _everyone_ gets to know that once again, Maya Hart wasn't good enough!

"Nobody is ever going to pick me over you and I've learned to be OK with that, but it is _really_ freakin' hard to be OK when you get rejected to your face and the whole world gets to know it happened. And that's _entirely_ because you felt the need to butt in. So, no. I don't want you involved in it anymore. I don't want you to tell me it's gonna be all right, or to try and convince Lucas to give me a chance, or any other version of your help that's just gonna end in another round of humiliation for me when it doesn't work out. I just…" Maya trails off, her bluster fading away in an instant and her form deflating. "I just need to deal with this on my own, and not...deal with _you_ for a couple days."

"Then…I'll just give you your space." Riley feels particularly shattered by Maya's outburst. Has she really messed things up so badly, just trying to do the right thing? Suddenly Maya is heartbroken and embarrassed and _angry_ and it almost sounds to Riley like she's made her friend feel this way before, which shouldn't be possible. Riley's never wanted anything but happiness for her. She's never done anything for her that didn't have something good as the intent. But the intent must fall apart along the way or _something_ otherwise Maya wouldn't be acting like this.

Of course, she has every right to be upset if Lucas said he doesn't return her feelings. That Riley understands (although she had thought for sure that Lucas had liked Maya enough to at least give things with her a chance). But Maya is acting like this is something that happens all the time. Like they constantly want the same things and Riley is the one who gets them. _That_ Riley doesn't understand. She can only remember a handful of times during their entire friendship that she and Maya truly competed with each other for something and those always seemed to work out so everyone was happy.

So it hurts that Maya is acting like Riley has gotten everything and everyone she's ever wanted. It hurts that her best friend in the world doesn't want her to help, or even comfort, her. It hurts because she knows no matter what, this particular incident of struggle for Maya _is_ her fault. It all piles on top of her own emotional ache and everything _hurts_ , but she can't even show it or release the mass of tears and emotion welling in her throat because then she'd be the girl who makes someone else's problems about her.

Riley can't be that on top of everything else.

"Best idea you've had all weekend." Maya says. Her cold tone is just another knife, and it takes everything Riley has left to keep everything in as she bows her head and leaves the room.

A few stray tears escape as she pads through the house, but Riley does her best to contain them just in case she runs into anyone else. She doesn't want to have to explain the whole mess to anyone else; knowing her luck that would somehow make everything worse. She grabs a throw blanket from the back of the couch and makes her way to the backyard, hoping that things there will be nice and quiet.

* * *

" _I always want you around. Maybe the best way to do that is to be like brother and sister."_

Sitting by himself at the fire, Lucas had a lot of time to think about everything that's happened. Time to think about what he said to Maya and decide that he handled that as best as he knew how and that even if Maya is upset, he doesn't regret being honest with her. Time to consider everything that Riley has told him since that afternoon and realize there might be a slight chance that she wasn't clarifying their relationship because that's how she really feels.

Instead of wondering what he's missed leading up to this sudden change, he goes back to what he knows about Riley. He knows that she's insecure and a worrier, so what might happen to them in the future would probably be on her mind (what she said at Chubbie's only confirmed that for him). She also would do anything for her friends to make them happy; it's not a stretch then that if she realized Maya's feelings for him she might think the right thing to do would be to step back for Maya (even less of one if she somehow got it into her head that he returned Maya's feelings). If those two traits came together at the right time in her head, it could have led to the idea behind her brush off.

Lucas also knows that Riley believes in Pluto and the impossible. She's had an example in front of her for her entire life in her parents. And maybe if she really is only saying that they're brother and sister because she's scared and trying to be a good friend, then all he has to do is convince her that _they_ are something worth believing in.

If.

It's a big, honking if. Lucas thinks he's onto something with his theory, but he can't be sure. There's always a chance that Riley really feels like he's nothing more than another brother to her and then it won't matter what he says, not that he'd say much at all if she tells him it's true. Above all, if they're not going to be together, he still wants to find a way for them to be friends, and that won't happen if he doesn't respect her feelings.

Either way, he plans on finding some time to talk to her alone while they're traveling tomorrow.

Lucas has put out the last embers of the fire and walked back to Pappy Joe's house when he finds her wrapped up in a blanket and laying on the hammock in the backyard. She's on her back like she's staring up at the stars but as he gets closer, Lucas realizes that her eyes are closed.

"Riley?" He calls out in a half-hushed tone. He's afraid to wake her but her eyes snap open at his voice and she bolts upright. The hammock rocks violently and she has to throw out her arms and legs to steady herself; miraculously she doesn't flip completely over and after a moment the hammock finds its equilibrium. "Sorry I didn't mean to startle you."

"It's OK." Riley waves him off, rubbing a hand over her face. She carefully slides to the edge of the hammock and sits. Her feet stick out from the tangled blanket and he realizes that she's not wearing any shoes. "I didn't realize that I was dozing off."

"Are you sleeping out here?"

Riley shakes her head quickly. "No, I...maybe." She brushes her hair behind her ear. "Maya's...not very happy with me right now."

That's an unexpected twist. Lucas has only ever seen the pair really in a fight the one time and it doesn't seem likely that this would be the thing that would cause another. The one thing he knows for sure is that Riley doesn't have a malicious bone in her body so no matter what she was trying to do tonight when she made all of her announcements, she wasn't doing it to make things bad for anyone. It doesn't make sense that Maya would blame Riley for what happened.

Then Lucas remembers his own anger towards her for putting him in such a difficult position, and realizes that maybe it's not that far of a stretch for Maya, who was definitely and deeply affected by the night's course of events, to be frustrated with her as well. He sighs and sits next to Riley on the hammock. "I'm pretty confused with you myself."

"Well I'm confused with you." She retorts, a little more fiercely than he expects. "Things would have worked out fine for everyone if you had just tried things with Maya. I know you like her, and you two have so much chemistry. Why didn't you give her a chance?"

"Because I don't think of her like that. She's my friend. Nothing more."

"But if you-,"

"Riley." Lucas cuts her off. He's not going to let her continue with this line of fantasy. He's still confused about a lot, but he knows that as with Maya's feelings, the longer this goes on, the worse the eventual fall is going to be. "If you really don't like me as anything more than a friend then I can respect that, but you have to respect my feelings too. They haven't changed and I'm not gonna force myself to have feelings that I don't have for Maya just to make this change less...awkward or whatever."

"Oh."

Riley falls silent, and Lucas thinks about the plans he had been making to talk to her the next day. Now doesn't seem like the right time to bring up his feelings and see if she was telling the truth. A part of him thinks he should ask about the fight she's had with Maya, but a bigger part says it's not his business and that finding out will only make his own involvement more complicated.

What he wouldn't give to be back in New York dropping hints to Mr. Matthews to get a specially crafted lesson that would make all of this seem less confusing.

"When she was...yelling at me, Maya said you had feelings for me." Riley says softly after a moment. She pushes her feet against the ground and starts the hammock swinging. "Is that true?"

He thinks about not answering, but eventually nods. "Yeah. I still like you Riley. As more than a friend."

"Why didn't you say anything?"

"Because you said I needed to accept what you were saying. Why would I push back and risk our friendship when I have no real reason to think you're not telling me the truth?"

Another long moment passes before Riley speaks. "I wasn't lying at Chubbie's. I don't ever want us to lose how close we are. I worry that if we get serious and break up that we'll step out of each other's lives. That's why I was OK with how slow we were taking things. But..." She trails off and doesn't continue.

"But…?" Lucas prompts.

"But I never once doubted my feelings for you." Riley finishes after taking a deep breath. When the words are out she falls so she's lying back, looking at the stars once more. She keeps talking. "When the yearbook came out, and Maya pretended to be me, she figured that we were so alike that I had to be confused and really liked you like a brother. She didn't realize that I heard her. I tried to get her to talk to me about it a couple of times, so maybe I could explain she was wrong, but she never told me. And I couldn't figure out why. I didn't realize until she wouldn't watch you ride Tombstone that it was because _she_ liked you. And maybe she wouldn't talk to me because she thought I would accept it better if I realized it on my own. That everything would all work out. I'd find someone new and you and her would...naturally end up together.

"So I let my fear take over. I decided that if she really was right, maybe we would all end up being happy. You and I would stay friends. You and her would have each other. All I needed to do was forget how I felt about you and everything would work out.

"I didn't realize that it doesn't work like that. You can't just turn off feelings."

Riley doesn't look at him the entire time she speaks, just stares up at the sky. Lucas lies back next to her and follows suit. He's trying to take in everything that she says. That her feelings haven't really changed, that she's been dealing with Maya's secret, wondering why her best friend wouldn't talk to her, that his theory was right…

"No, you can't." He agrees with her. He lets his head fall to the side, so he's looking at her. "Which is why I don't totally understand why you're so scared. We've always been friends first. Do you really think that us dating could change that?"

"I don't know." She shakes her head. "It seems to happen with everyone else. It doesn't seem to matter how much they care. Someone gets hurt and everything changes."

"Everything's already changing, Riley. At this point I don't think there's any stopping it."

Riley chuckles softly, sounding almost sad. "Time and tide wait for no man. My grandma—mom's mom—always says that."

"She's not wrong."

"Well...technically Chaucer's not wrong but..." Riley trails off, and reaches up to run a hand through her hair before she finally turns her head to face him. "What are we gonna do now?"

She seems small, looking at him through her eyelashes and chewing on the inside of her lip. Riley always stands so tall and brave when things are hard and going wrong, it's easy to forget that she's a year younger than him. This isn't just about her being afraid of change, it's about her not understanding it too. Not that he totally gets it, but there's something to be said for that extra year of adjustment time.

"Unless I missed something, the feelings between us haven't changed, and I know you're worried about what could happen, I think about that too, but…" Lucas hesitates for a brief moment. What he wants to say could make things great, or it could make things worse. It's a fifty-fifty coin flip and it feels like the coin is suspended above his head, just spinning. The fear that things will get worse makes him want to just shut his mouth and snatch the coin out of the air; the hope that things will improve gets him to keep talking. "But I think by now I know you well enough to know that you would never do anything to hurt me or put anything, even our romantic feelings, above our friendship. I trust you. Do you trust me?"

Riley's hand slips into his and she smiles. "Of course I trust you, Lucas. You're always there for me."

"Then maybe we forget about what happened today. Let things between us go back to how they were. Our unofficial thing was working pretty good for us. I know it was slow but...it _was_ moving. And in a pretty good direction."

"The best."

Their heads start to inch closer together. All Lucas has to do is tilt the angle of his chin and their lips would find each other. The air feels suddenly thick around them and from one moment to the next, it feels like the spark might fly between them.

Then Riley gasps, and pulls her hand away. "We can't." She sits up and when he does the same, she steps off the hammock and turns around to face him. "I'm sorry Lucas, but we can't go back now. I can't hurt Maya like that. I know to you she's just a friend but she _likes_ you and she's so upset and she already hates me for all of this. I can't make things worse by-"

"No, you're right. Things are too complicated right now." Lucas nods. He's not sure what he was thinking, trying to jump right back. He knows how important Maya is to Riley and that for her, that friendship is always going to come first. She broke things off because of how Maya feels, and until that changes, there's no way she's going to go back on that decision. "All we can be is friends."

She tries to smile for him but ends up turning away to look at the ground after barely a second. "Yeah. Friends."


	2. Chapter 2

Notes: Thanks to everyone who reviewed, subscribed, and favorited!

I know on the show it was implied that the group took a train to Texas, but that makes absolutely no sense for a weekend trip so they're flying in this version.

* * *

"And then she told me that she'll consider it a personal offense if I don't keep in touch, and that she's gonna try and convince her parents that they should take their vacation in the city this year." Zay unrolls a sleeping bag across the living room floor while he excitedly recounts his night out with Vanessa. "Who knew that all it takes for a girl to notice you is to have other girls flirt with you in front of her?"

Lucas and Farkle share a look with each other before staring pointedly at their friend. "Everyone."

"Oh, like you two are such great experts on women."

"Better than you. I have Izzy, and Lucas here has-," Farkle cuts himself off and his grin fades as he seems to notice the territory they're approaching. He and Zay have been in high spirits since their return from the ice cream shop and even with his new complications and relationship troubles to deal with Lucas found their excitement and enthusiasm infectious enough to relax and turn his mind off of worrying about what was going to happen with Riley and Maya for a few minutes. Until now. "Well, what is happening there?"

Zay nods, stopping his work in setting up his makeshift bed. "Yeah, what happened after we left the campfire? And why is Riley sleeping in your room?"

The original plan for the weekend was for the boys to sleep in the room that Pappy Joe keeps for Lucas whenever he stays over and for Riley and Maya to share the actual guest room, but, like most of the other things Lucas had been planning on for this trip, with everything that's happened today, that has gone out the window. "I gave Riley my room because she and Maya had a fight." Lucas says and he goes on to explain that Riley had been planning on sleeping out back in the hammock and the only real option was to insist she take his room and that the boys could sleep out in the living room. He doesn't mention that since she left all of her things in the guest room and neither of them were in the position to disturb Maya, he also left her with one of his sweatshirts so she wouldn't have to spend an uncomfortable night sleeping in her clothes; information like that would only fuel the fire of Zay's interest and lead to some sort of awkward situation later on when he inevitably makes an inappropriate comment.

"What did they fight about?" Farkle asks.

Before Lucas can answer, Zay claps him on the shoulder. "Adjusting to the brother thing just fine, I see."

Lucas jerks from the touch, feeling the tethers he has on his control slip away. He's been so careful all day, schooling his reactions when Maya refused to support him at the rodeo and when Riley first gave her speech ending things between them. His world has gone upside down figuratively and literally multiple times today and he thinks he's done a pretty good job of staying calm and thinking things through before he reacts. But doing all of that has been exhausting and hearing someone else call Riley his sister, even when they've already straightened things out and both agree that's not what she really is, is enough to bypass the walls of control he has left.

"Riley is _not_ my sister!" He watches the wide-eyed look that passes between Farkle and Zay and immediately feels bad for unleashing his frustration on them. "Sorry." He sighs and falls back onto the couch. "It's just...After you guys left us at the fire, I told Maya that I only like her as a friend."

"Oh snap." Zay whistles. "That couldn't have gone over well."

"It was fine. I mean, she wasn't happy but she wasn't mad or anything either. It seemed fine. And later Riley and I talked. She admitted that the brother thing wasn't true. We both still like each other."

Farkle has half a smile on his face as he raises an eyebrow. "Well, that's a good thing, isn't it? Things can go back to how they were and everyone's happy."

"Not exactly. Things _seemed_ OK. Maya's pretty upset. Riley wouldn't really tell me about it, but I'm pretty sure that's what the fight was about."

Zay nods sagely, sitting cross-legged on the floor. "Oh, I know about this one. You both still like each other, only you can't do anything about it because it would be unfair to Maya, leaving everyone in an uncomfortable, tensely awkward limbo. They've spent the last season and a half dealing with something just like it on _High School Love Dodecahedron_."

"You actually watch _High School Love Dodecahedron?"_

"You don't?" Zay returns Farkle's incredulous question with one of his own. "It's amazing."

"It's the same episode every week. Person A likes B who used to date C and D has a thing for B, even though B is still totally hung up on C, and E and F are dating but F is flirting with D. Two of them have a moment where it looks like they'll finally get together but at the last minute someone else shows up and ruins everything with a dramatic revelation. And it starts all over again."

Lucas smirks, his drama temporarily put on hold. "For someone who doesn't watch the show you sure seem to know a lot about it."

Zay and Farkle both ignore him. "I know it can get a little cheesy and dramatic," Zay admits, "but it's addicting. Everyone has chemistry with everyone else, and you _have_ to watch to find out who's going to be endgame. Plus, the writers are really active on Twitter, and they swear that by the end of the season these crazy kids are gonna work everything out. Which is great because things have been super awkward and sad since Rose and Logan decided to only be friends to spare Mia's feelings."

His plot summary brings things back to reality. Lucas wants to roll his eyes as he usually would when Zay tries to compare television and real life, but this comparison hits a little too close to home. He shakes his head instead to get rid of the unease settling in his stomach. There's no reason to think things will happen anything like they do on the show. Riley, Maya, and him are real people. They're not stuck under the control of some writers' room beholden to a divided fan base; they know how to talk with each other and straighten things out on their own. "It's not gonna be awkward."

They both look skeptical. "Then what is gonna happen?"

"Riley and Maya are gonna figure things out and we're all just gonna be friends." Another look is exchanged between Farkle and Zay, like they both think he's being crazy and unrealistic. "We are. Riley and I agree that our friendship and Maya's is more important than anything romantic that might happen between us."

"I'm sure you did man." Zay says, looking just as unconvinced. "And I don't know a lot about this stuff, so maybe it'll work out just like you said, but in my...limited experience, what you think is the right thing to do and what your feelings make you do aren't always the same thing."

* * *

Riley knows that at some point she fell asleep, because she doesn't know that the sun is up until it's flooding the room and everything is too bright for her to keep her eyes closed, but it feels like she's been awake for days. Her eyes still feel tired and grainy, her mind is sluggish and if it weren't for the too hot feeling of being tangled up in the sheets and blankets she wouldn't want to move at all. A glance at the clock on the bedside table tells her that it's barely after seven, and on a normal weekend she wouldn't think twice about rolling over, throwing a pillow over her head and going back to sleep but since they have to spend most of the day traveling to get back to New York for school on Monday and that means a relatively early start, now seems as good a time as any to get up and get going.

Especially if getting up before everyone else means she'll be able to get her things out of the guest room and get ready for the day without anyone seeing her in Lucas' sweatshirt. The last thing they need is for anyone to get the wrong idea about what's going on between them, particularly Maya.

So Riley rolls out of the bed and does her best to smooth out the bedding before grabbing yesterday's clothes off the floor and tiptoeing out of the room.

She'd had a hard time falling asleep last night. Her mind had been racing, trying to process the day and to figure out what things were going to be like now. And now that she's awake, she's right back to thinking about it. What are things going to be like with everyone today? What do Zay and Farkle know about what happened last night? Is Maya still going to be mad at her? Are things with Lucas going to be awkward or weird?

Riley knows that choosing to be just friends with him was the right decision; she's not the sort of person who does something when she knows it will cause someone else pain and being with Lucas would definitely hurt Maya. Plus if they stay friends instead of boyfriend and girlfriend, they don't have to worry about anything hurting their relationship so that's two pluses right there for keeping things platonic. It's for the best for things to stay as they are (even if Lucas brought up some good points last night and she's not _as_ worried about that) and it's doing the right thing by Maya. Riley knows that they made the right decision, but it still hurts and feels strange and she can't help but wonder if that's going to carry over when they talk to each other again.

A part of her thinks awkward would be better. If they're awkward, it should be obvious that nothing is happening between them. Maya's upset, at least partly, because Lucas didn't share her feelings and because Riley caused that revelation. Riley has to believe that she'll only feel worse if she thinks that Riley and Lucas are completely ignoring her feelings and moving forward with their own relationship. She wants it to be as clear as possible that nothing has changed and she and Lucas aren't going to be anything other than friends. Maya might be ready to hear an apology sooner if she realizes that Riley's trying to make it up to her.

Which is why she's worried about anyone seeing her in Lucas' sweatshirt. Obviously nothing happened, Lucas was just being a good host, but she knows what it looks like if you're wearing anything of a boy's, especially if you slept in it. She can only imagine the winking comments and innuendo if Zay were to see her.

Thankfully, other than the sounds of someone moving around the kitchen the house is still quiet, and it seems she's lucked out. Riley darts down the hall to the guest room. The door is ajar so she walks right in, assuming Maya is still asleep. Instead Riley finds her standing at the dresser, getting ready for the day. She's already dressed, hair wet from a shower, and doing her makeup in the mirror.

Maya notices her right away. She doesn't stop the application of her lip gloss, just angles her eyes briefly to take in Riley's reflection. She sighs once, but doesn't say anything and Riley has never felt smaller in the presence of her friend. Obviously, she's not ready to talk about it.

"I just...need to grab my things and I'll get out of your way." Riley says, angling past Maya to get to her overnight bag. Maya still doesn't say anything, which hurts more than Riley would care to admit. They've fought before, but even during their worst arguments that lasted for days they would still talk to each other; it's always still felt like she had her best friend. Now it hasn't been twelve hours and Maya's not even acknowledging her and if her words the night before had been painful they had nothing on the aching void of this silence. It seems like the only thing to do is copy her and not say anything lest her feelings betray her so Riley simply grabs her bag and turns to leave.

Maya's flat tone stops her under the door frame. "Nice sweatshirt."

Of course she noticed. Of course she recognized it. Why would anything go the way Riley was planning? She takes a deep breath and turns around, hoping Maya will listen to the explanation. "I didn't have anything to sleep in."

"So naturally you went running to him."

"I didn't want to bother you while you were so upset."

"Saint Riley to the rescue."

Riley does her best to ignore Maya's bitter comment. She reminds herself that she's only lashing out because she's hurt, hopes she doesn't mean half of it, and tells herself that if Maya wants to be mad at someone it's better that it's her. Another part of her still crumbles. "You asked for space. I was just giving it to you."

"But you gave it to me by going to him."

Riley frowns. Maya may be hurt and disappointed but why isn't she listening? Why doesn't she trust that Riley would never do anything to hurt her? "Lucas is my friend, Maya."

Maya finally turns around. "So are Farkle and Zay. Why aren't you wearing something of theirs?"

"They weren't here. Lucas was. Why are you being so weird about this?" Riley wants to be calm and reasonable about all of this so when Maya is ready, fixing things will be easier. She knows if she loses her temper and things escalate there will only be more stuff to straighten out and apologize for later, but she can feel her patience dwindling. She's willing to cut Maya a fair amount of slack, but it's not fair that she's acting like she's the only one affected by what happened the night before. Things are different for all of them now. They're all going to have to adjust and things would go a lot better if Maya would at least acknowledge that and maybe remember that she's dealing with friends who care about her.

"I don't think it's _weird_ to be upset that you went right back to how things were with him. Supposedly he's your brother now, but the second you find out he doesn't like me you go running back to him."

"I didn't go running to him, he found me, Maya." Riley throws her hands up. Maya's not listening and she's twisting everything around and Riley can't keep banging her fists against that wall. Her patience snaps. "And yeah, we talked about everything but the only thing we went back to is friendship. Lucas is my friend. One of my best friends. I'm sorry he doesn't like you, really, I am, because I know it would have made you happy and I know how hurt you are now and I hate that you feel like that. But last night you didn't want my help and just because you want to stay alone and feel sorry for yourself doesn't mean I have to. I'm not gonna stop hanging out with someone who's been a good friend to me when his only crime is not returning your feelings and being up front about it instead of leading you on, and if you think that I should then maybe _we_ aren't as good friends as I thought."

Riley storms out before Maya has a chance to form a reply and hurries down the hall to the bathroom. Her bluster fades as soon as the door closes behind her. What was she thinking? What happened to being a calm voice of reason? How could she give into her own hurt and irritation like that? This was supposed to be about Maya.

She blinks back her frustration and disappointment in herself and clenches her jaw tightly as she starts to get ready for the day.

Riley forgoes a shower (she'll just feel gross after a day on a plane and take one when she gets home anyways) opting instead to throw her hair up into a messy bun. She brushes her teeth and washes her face before changing her clothes and stuffing everything haphazardly back into her bag. She doesn't bother with makeup; more often than not she still feels like a little girl playing dress-up when wears more than lip gloss, not like a fierce woman in her war paint like Maya and her mom seem to become with just a swipe of blush and mascara.

Besides which, she's Riley 'Sunshine' Matthews. Her smile _is_ her war paint. So before she leaves to go get breakfast she finds one in the mirror.

Riley leaves her bag back in Lucas' room and goes to the kitchen, where Pappy Joe has made a veritable feast. Lucas, Farkle, and Zay are all sitting around the table still in their pajamas, devouring the food. Maya has a plate of eggs, but despite there being space at the table, she's sitting in the makeshift bay window staring outside while she eats. Riley's heart gives off an echo-y pang in her chest and her smile droops down a little. She can't even decide what to do about it before Pappy Joe greets her.

"Good mornin' Miss Riley."

"Good morning Pappy Joe." She boosts her grin back up for him. He's been so welcoming this weekend and doesn't deserve to get any drama or upset as his thanks.

"Sit right down and help yourself to whatever you want. You kids have a long day ahead of you and the best way to start that off right is with a full stomach."

"Well everything looks great." Riley comments, taking the empty seat between Zay and Farkle. The table is loaded with breakfast food. Stacks of pancakes, a pile of scrambled eggs, toast, breakfast meats, pitchers of milk and orange juice, and just about anything a person might want to put on top of any of it. "I don't even know where to start."

Farkle serves himself several slices of bacon, piling them on top of his half-eaten pancakes. "If you want any of this I'd get going on it. This pig is shaping up to be my next tasty conquest."

Lucas smirks. "I don't think we have the whole pig."

Pappy Joe reminds them that they have an hour before they have to leave for the airport and excuses himself from the room. Riley pours herself some orange juice while the boys talk more about how many pieces of bacon equals a whole pig and enjoys the moment; aside from Maya distancing herself from the group things feel natural and comfortable. There's a glimmer of hope that not everything has changed.

But just as quickly, in a rush of pessimism she's not used to, Riley finds herself wondering what she'll have to sacrifice to keep _this_ the same. She shakes the thought away as quickly as she can. Negativity doesn't fix or improve anything.

It only takes a minute or two for the bacon discussion to taper off and then Lucas is quick to change subjects. He turns to face her. "Did you sleep OK, Riley?"

Her heart melts a little at his caring tone and the warmth in the smile aimed in her direction. Her own grin grows and feels more genuine than it has all morning, but a fork clattering against a plate breaks the spell. Everyone glances toward Maya, who's staring resolutely at her food and fumbling to get her fork back in her hand. Lucas' smile fades and Riley immediately busies herself, serving herself breakfast. "I slept fine." She answers as shortly and closed off as she can manage. They're friends, nothing more, and friends can make small talk about how they slept or the weather or anything else but they can't do it smiling at each other like no one else in the world exists. They'll give everyone the wrong idea. "Did you?"

"Fine." Lucas nods.

"Good." Several beats pass and no one says anything. Riley focuses on buttering her toast, but even without looking she can feel everyone's eyes, can practically hear them moving between the triangle of Maya, Lucas, and her, waiting for _something_ to happen.

"Wow." Zay says, breaking the silence after many agonizing seconds. Sarcasm practically drips from his voice. "You were _so right_ , Luke. This isn't awkward at all."

* * *

"That must have been some fight last night." Lucas comments, sliding up next to Riley in while she browses in the airport gift shop. Technically everyone else thinks that he's left the group in the terminal to go to the bathroom, but that was just a convenient excuse. He's wanted to talk to Riley since the awkward encounter at breakfast, but there's been no opportunity; they can't talk in front of everyone and they've been stuck with the group for most of the morning. But now that they're through security and waiting for the flight to start boarding, everyone is quite happy to break away from each other and take a moment to breathe air that's not thick with awkward tension.

As Zay's comment had indicated, things are now completely uncomfortable. With everyone. Maya's quiet and distancing herself from everyone, but she's still watching and every time something happens between Riley and himself, even if it's just their hands brushing as they walk past each other or him asking Riley to pass the syrup, it's like he's telling her that his feelings are for Riley all over again she looks so hurt. In response Riley is trying overly hard to keep things platonic. She won't sit next to him or address him directly. She'll talk to the group, or even just Farkle or Zay, but not him. Lucas is pretty sure that she hasn't relaxed or taken a real breath since that first moment around the breakfast table. And while Zay and Farkle are trying to make normal conversation and keep the silence to a minimum, everything comes off as stilted and unsure.

Lucas doesn't know how long the group can possibly keep this up before the fracture becomes worse or permanent and he really doesn't want to find out. The only solution he can think of is to talk to Riley about what they need to do to make things easier for Maya since obviously what they're doing now isn't working. So when Riley goes to get some gum for the flight, he seizes the opportunity and comes up with his own reason to leave the gate.

"Maya's barely even looking at you."

Riley jumps a little at his voice, then relaxes after she realizes it's him. She glances towards him, but refocuses on the rack of magazines in front of her after barely a moment. "This morning didn't help. She saw me in your sweatshirt."

"Oh."

"Yeah. I tried to explain what happened, but she wouldn't believe me or she thought that I shouldn't be friends with you or something and I got mad when I should have just kept my mouth shut..." Riley sighs. "At this rate we're never gonna fix things."

At the disheartened look on her face Lucas forgets all about his own worries. Riley has never not been optimistic. She's always the one with hope and seeing her so upset and lost is painful. He wants things to be better for Maya—for her to be less hurt and for everyone to go back to being friends—but in the moment all he can see is Riley's own broken look and all he cares about is doing everything he can to make it go away. "It hasn't even been a day."

"I know...I'm just so worried." She says. She finally turns to face him, crossing her arms over her chest. "She won't talk to either of us...she's barely talking to Farkle and Zay...I've known Maya forever. She used to always pull away from people when she was upset, and it took years but I finally convinced her that friends are there to help you deal with that stuff, but now she's going right back to it. What if we lose her over this?"

"Riley, you're not gonna lose Maya. You're doing everything you can to make this easier on her. She just needs a little bit of time and she'll realize that." Lucas reassures. "And in the meantime, you left Farkle and Zay with strict orders to make sure she knows she can talk with them." When they had gotten their seat assignments upon check in for their flight and found that they had been given two sets of paired seats and one single, Riley had even been quick to volunteer to sit on her own and enthusiastically suggest that Farkle and Maya and Zay and Lucas sit together; she's definitely making an effort to be a good friend for Maya, even if she can't do it directly, and if Maya doesn't realize that eventually Lucas will be more than happy to step in and set her straight. "She may be mad at us, and she'll probably stay mad at me, but in a day or two she'll get that you didn't do anything to her."

"You didn't do anything wrong either."

Lucas shakes his head. "If she needs someone to blame, it makes more sense for it to be me. I'm fine with that." He's more than fine with it; he's known from the day he met them that Riley and Maya considered each other to be the most important people in their lives (outside of family) and the last thing he wants is to be the reason that they lose that. "My point is, you don't have anything to worry about. She's still wearing her ring, isn't she? If she hasn't taken that off, it's only a matter of time before you guys figure things out."

"Maybe you're right." Riley manages half a smile. "I think I'm letting all this silence get to my head. Things are never this quiet with us."

"It doesn't have to be quiet, Riley. We're here for Maya, but we're also here for you too. If you ever need to talk..." Lucas puts a hand on her shoulder as he trails off. Riley reaches up and lays her hand on top of his, meshing her fingers between his. She pulls so their hands come down to hang between them, but doesn't let go.

"That's really sweet Lucas, but I'll be fine. I just need to keep my priorities. And right now my priority needs to be her."

Lucas has his mouth open to correct her when the announcement declaring that their flight is starting to board comes over the airport loudspeaker.

"That's us." Riley drops his hand. "Go ahead back to the gate and make sure they don't leave without me, yeah? I still need to get some gum."

She turns to look at a rack of candy and doesn't leave Lucas much of a choice. He knows part of it is that she doesn't want to show up at the gate with him and get everyone talking once again, so instead of fighting her on it, Lucas leaves, feeling all the world like he's abandoning an important conversation and not at all certain what's going to happen next.


	3. Chapter 3

Here's part 3. Thanks so much to everyone who's been reading and reviewing and everything in between. It's so helpful and encouraging for me to hear what you all think!

* * *

"Matthews, find your focus before practice this afternoon or don't bother coming at all."

"Yes Coach Kelly." Riley nods, sliding her notebook off of her desk as she stands. She blushes and doesn't meet the strict coach's eyes but doesn't fight her on the chastisement. She's right to be disappointed. The cheer squad is wrapping up a video review session during morning study hall and throughout the entire forty minutes her mind has been everywhere except for watching the tapes. She knows she needs to try harder but it's just so difficult to focus with everything going on.

After getting back to the city late in the afternoon the day before, Riley had spent most of night telling her parents about Texas while dodging around everything that had happened between her, Maya, and Lucas, and as in Texas, sleep hadn't come easy. All she wants is a couple of a nice, quiet days so everyone can step back and calm down before they talk things through. It shouldn't be that hard; the only people who know for sure what happened are the five of them who went to Texas, and even if things aren't exactly good between all of them it shouldn't raise too much of a fuss as long as they aren't acting like the world is ending. That's what she had thought anyways. But when she got to school that morning she found the fuss was already raised.

Riley has no idea why, but all morning everyone in the school has been buzzing, gossiping enthusiastically about what the group might have gone through on their trip to the Lone Star State.

She can't imagine where they even got the idea that anything had happened. She hasn't seen Maya or Lucas yet, so it's not like anyone has been witness to the tension between them. She knows Farkle would never say anything, which leaves Zay, but Lucas had been so annoyed about him spilling the beans about Judy the Sheep that he had promised Zay that if he ever started telling other people's secrets again (especially his) then he would have no choice but to tell everyone the party balloon story. Riley has no idea what that story might be, but it got Zay _very_ on board with secrecy _very_ quickly and she has her doubts that he would have started talking about anything other than Vanessa or the rodeo. And yet everyone's been staring and asking questions, and it's officially impossible to think about anything else.

"Don't worry about it, Sunshine." Jenkins slides next to her as they leave the classroom. "Everybody has problems paying attention at these things. Coach just happened to notice you today. She'll make you run a few laps during practice and it'll be like nothing ever happened."

Riley sighs. Of all the girls on the cheerleading squad, Jenkins is the friendliest and most supportive, and it means a lot to have her by her side. On most days when she's struggling through the choreography or to tackle a new trick a few of her kind words are all Riley needs to force herself to grin harder and try again; today her own positivity is feeling drained and she's trying to focus what she does have on believing things with Maya are going to work out, and instead of lifting her up Jenkins' words seem to float right past her. "Yeah, she'll forget being mad at me for this and go back to just resenting me for being the klutzy, no-rhythm interloper she didn't want to let on the team in the first place."

"Hey now!" Jenkins stops and grabs Riley's arm, frowning. "That doesn't sound like my favorite energizer bunny. Is everything OK?"

Riley quickly realizes her mistake. She shakes her head, runs a hand through her hair and finds a smile. "No, yeah, I'm fine. Just a little tired from the trip. I'll take a nap during lunch or my dad's class or something and be good as new."

"Are you sure?" Jenkins pushes. "I've seen you exhausted after tough practices and you never get so down on yourself."

"Of course!" Riley bounces on her heels and starts walking and although Jenkins joins her, she doesn't look convinced. After a brief moment's thought she decides that a small bit of honesty can't hurt, as long as the whole story doesn't get out. "I guess I'm just feeling weird being the center of attention like this." She admits. "I don't know if you've noticed but everyone thinks something happened in Texas."

Jenkins doesn't seem surprised in the slightest. In fact, she almost looks curious. "Didn't it?"

Riley knows her confusion takes over her face, but she can't help it. Where is everyone getting this idea from? "What makes you say that?"

Jenkins rolls her eyes and giggles. "Sunshine, everybody knows that when you go away on a school trip or a vacation with your friends that's when things go crazy. You have a special moment with someone, feelings get stronger...things _always_ change when you go somewhere new."

 _Everybody_ knows that? Since when? Riley's a part of everybody and she definitely didn't know anything about this. If she had she might not have agreed to the trip. Or at the very least she would have tried to convince her parents to forbid her from going. None of this would have happened if she hadn't let her feelings get the better of her and make her go crazy, and apparently her feelings wouldn't have gone all haywire if she hadn't been in Texas.

Maya would probably be happier. It's easy for Riley to picture. Lucas would have been the one to talk to her about storming off at the rodeo and they probably would have spent the whole afternoon talking. Their time at the fire would have actually been their special moment and maybe they'd be nervous about telling her when they got back but Riley would reassure them that things were fine if that was how they felt (even if it would be a lie). One day she'd get over it and they would all eventually find their balance and happiness.

That's not what's going to happen now. Riley was too much in the picture for Lucas to consider Maya in Texas (even after she tried breaking their half-relationship off) and she can't pretend that she'd be OK with any similar change now, because all of their feelings are out there; everyone in the group knows that she and Lucas have serious feelings for each other, and that Maya has feelings for Lucas too. If he changed his mind now she could do her best to pretend that she was OK with it and everybody would still doubt her. And poor Maya would probably wonder why he suddenly changed his mind and if he would ever change it back. Not to mention she and Lucas can't embrace their feelings because it would be a complete betrayal of Maya. A good friend doesn't even think about the guy her best friend has feelings for like that. Even if Maya does come back to hear an apology, Riley's not sure that the group will be able to go back to how it was.

Why hadn't anyone warned her about how things change on special trips?

"Just tell someone about the trip and their interest will die down." Jenkins advises, laying a hand on Riley's shoulder. "I have to get to my Spanish class. Don't stress out about this, Sunshine. Talk about it or don't. By tomorrow someone else's drama will have their attention, and you'll be old news. I'll catch you at practice."

"Yeah, see you then."

Jenkins leaves, heading one way down the hall, and Riley keeps walking towards her locker, all the while thinking about Jenkins' advice. _Just tell someone about the trip and interest will die down_. There's just no way that would work. She knows from experience that the moment you give someone a little information, it just gives them more questions.

Like when they found out that she and Lucas went on a date. Nobody just said, 'Oh that's nice' and moved on. They asked if they were boyfriend and girlfriend. Everyone always wanted more.

Riley knows that this won't be any different; if people find out what happened in Texas the gossip will only make things worse. They'll want to know what she was thinking and exactly how everything happened and what was said and why she and Lucas aren't together now. Not to mention, if Maya was embarrassed when just the five of them knew, she'd be positively humiliated if the whole school were to find out. She'd probably never speak to Riley again.

So she can't tell the story and fuel the fire. She can't talk to Maya to see how she wants to handle it. She shouldn't talk to Lucas unless, at the very least, Farkle and Zay are there too unless she wants everyone else to just make up what they were talking about and they don't all have a class together until a whole class period from now (Farkle's in the math class that she's going to, but she'll have to get through that before they have art where everyone will be present). The only thing Riley can think of to do that won't make things worse is just grit her teeth at all of the chatter and do her best to focus in class until they can figure things out together. And who knows?

Maybe if everyone think she's the same as always they'll stop thinking anything happened to begin with and they won't need to figure anything out.

When Riley arrives at her locker to grab her math book, she stops several feet short; Maya's already at her locker, getting her things. Some of the other students in the hall notice and their whispers increase. It's all Riley can do not to turn and run to take refuge in the math classroom, textbook or no. The blonde turns around a moment later, hair swinging over her shoulder and it only takes a second for her eyes to find Riley's. Maya clenches her jaw and looks away just as quickly, before starting to walk away. As she passes Riley, her shoulder knocks into hers, but she doesn't say anything. It's like she's invisible, only somehow worse.

So much for everyone thinking things are the same as always.

* * *

Lucas isn't sure how, but by lunch most of the school seems to know exactly what happened in Texas. They know that Riley said she loved him like a brother and that when they were at a campfire she told him that Maya had feelings for him and gave them permission to date. They also know that not ten minutes later he told Maya that he had never thought of her like that. That at some point later in the night he and Riley must have made up because she was wearing his sweatshirt the next day.

That's the detail that really throws him. All five of them know the basics and could talk about them if they wanted (although Zay is the only real gossip in the group and Lucas has enough dirt on him to convince him to hold back when it's important) but only he, Riley, and Maya know about the sweatshirt. Lucas knows he didn't say anything. And based on how red Riley had gotten at the first mocking catcall from Missy Bradford, she didn't say anything either. Which leaves Maya, and that doesn't make sense either.

The story isn't just embarrassing for him or Riley. It's not great for her either. So why would she spread it around?

Lucas wants to ask. Maya's at a nearby table eating with Sarah and Darby and while she doesn't look as happy as she has at lunches with Riley, he doesn't think she looks nearly upset as she had the day before, or even earlier that morning. He might be more reluctant if she did, but as things stand the person facing the most scrutiny at the moment is Riley, and she doesn't deserve that. If Maya wants to throw crap at him he'll take it, but all Riley was trying to do was be a good friend. So he doesn't really care if confronting her will make things worse. He needs to know why she would tell everyone every single thing that happened between them when it's no one's business but theirs.

He leaves his half-finished tray on the table and stands. Ignoring the questioning looks from his friends, he starts to walk over. Lucas only gets halfway there before Mr. Matthews steps in front of him, a stern expression on his face.

"Mr. Friar, do you have a moment?"

He really doesn't, at least he doesn't want to, but Lucas doesn't consider himself to be in the position to disregard his teacher. Particularly when said teacher is also Riley's father and probably hearing the same rumors that the students are. "Uh...yeah. I guess. What can I do for you?"

"I've been hearing some very interesting things about what happened between you and Riley in Texas." Mr. Matthews says, guiding Lucas over to a spot away from the bulk of the tables. "Things about exchanged items of clothing that have very specific implications."

Lucas' mouth goes dry and he struggles to swallow. Crap, crap, crap. He can remember wishing for Mr. Matthews to learn the story and get involved, but that was before the story had grown and now he's cursing himself for even putting the thought out into the universe. Mr. Matthews probably wants to kill him. "Mr. Matthews, I know what people are saying, but nothing happened. I swear. I gave her my sweatshirt to sleep in but she took my room and I slept out in the living room. Nothing happened like people are saying. I would never-,"

"Lucas, you can relax." Mr. Matthews cuts him off. "I know how much you care about Riley and respect her and that at the very least, that piece of the story is nothing more than people's imaginations. But I did want to talk to you about it."

"I'm not sure I understand, sir."

"I was put in a similar position when I was about your age. I know it's a hard place to be."

Lucas wonders if Riley already knows this story since she's not nearly as upset at the way people are talking as he'd expect. She's definitely been embarrassed since the talk really got going but she hasn't seemed to be anything less than herself; maybe she already knows the sort of resolution that's on the way. He's going to ask for more information to help him gain some of that confidence (so far every time he thinks things with this whole mess are evening out they just get worse instead and it's definitely making it harder to maintain his own equilibrium) only Mr. Matthews keeps talking before he can.

"It's not always easy to do the right thing when everybody gets talking like this. It feels like people are going to talk whether you speak up or not, so why should you even bother?"

Lucas shakes his head. "I should bother because what they're saying isn't true. I just don't know how to make them listen."

Mr. Matthews smiles slightly and Lucas feels like he's passed some sort of test. "The people who matter will. And it will mean a lot to-," He continues to talk, and Lucas tries to pay attention, honestly he does, but out of the corner of his eye he notices a guy approaching the table where Riley is still sitting with Zay and Farkle. Charlie Gardner is approaching her, and Lucas always finds it hard to focus when Charlie is talking to Riley. Especially when they're close enough that he can hear.

"I wanted to talk to you because, well, people are talking." Charlie's saying. "I heard that you and Lucas aren't a thing anymore."

"I'm sure that's not the only thing you've heard." Riley crosses her arms over her chest, and looks more at the floor than she does at Charlie. She's standing instead of staying at the table or inviting him to sit with them, and Lucas wishes he knew what that meant.

"Yeah, but I think I know you _and_ Friar well enough to know that some of what's going around is just ridiculous."

Riley looks up, eyes wide. "Oh. Well...thanks. Is that what you wanted to tell me?"

"Actually I wanted to talk to you about the Spring Fling." Lucas can almost feel his heart stutter at Charlie's words. This can't be happening again. "It's coming up next month."

"I know. I'm on the planning committee." Riley nods.

"Right. So you know how great it's going to be."

"I guess."

"Well, I was thinking that it could be even greater if maybe we went together." A long beat passes, and it seems like at least half the cafeteria has stopped their own conversations to turn and watch this discussion; even Mr. Matthews has realized that something's going on. "What do you say, Riley? Will you go to the Spring Fling with me?"

To an outsider, Riley looks totally frozen. Her mouth hangs open. It barely even looks like she's breathing. But Lucas can see her eyes darting around the room—to him, to Maya, back to Charlie, and he can practically hear the thoughts grinding and racing her head. It goes on for several seconds, long enough that a few of the onlookers start to point and lose all subtlety with the volume of their comments. Lucas is considering heading back over to interrupt and give her an out, reputations and perceptions be damned when she refocuses solely on Charlie and speaks up.

"That's very sweet of you Charlie, but...it wouldn't be fair to you if I said yes." She brushes her hair behind her ear. "You deserve someone who's...interested in dating, and can really appreciate all the great things you have to offer, and right now that's just not me. I'm really sorry."

Charlie waves the apology off. "Don't be. You can't force yourself to have feelings when they're not there. At least you were honest with me."

As the duo ends the conversation and Charlie leaves, Mr. Matthews grabs Lucas' attention once more. "These things have a way of working out, Lucas. Just keep your head, and be there for Riley. You know where to find me if you need anything."

He claps Lucas on the shoulder before he walks away, and Lucas makes his way back to the lunch table, his planned interrogation with Maya completely forgotten.

* * *

" _I knew she's not as innocent as she acts."_

" _What a sneaky, little witch."_

" _I can't believe she did that to poor Maya."_

All afternoon, throughout her classes, cheer practice and getting home, all Riley's been able to think about are the cruel whispers of her classmates. It had been one thing when they were wondering what had happened in Texas, and even when they had heard the story and were assuming the details of what happened, but things had changed after she turned down Charlie's Spring Fling invitation. Suddenly the story is different again, and everyone says that the only reason she told Lucas that he was like her brother and revealed Maya's feelings in Texas was to test him and make sure he's committed. And while most everyone had seemed perfectly willing to take her and Lucas' word that the sweatshirt thing was nothing more than a borrowed piece of clothing when they corrected the gossipers, for whatever reason, about half the school seems unwilling to grant her the same belief when it comes to this. It's all Riley can do to stand and face the eye rolls and snide comments. Sure, there are some people standing by her, but it's just as important for Zay and Farkle to make sure that Maya's doing all right and it's not like she can really accept any comfort from Lucas or everyone really _will_ think that there's still something going on.

The worst part is, all she had to do was say yes to Charlie and it wouldn't have happened. When he had approached her in the cafeteria, Riley had known everyone was paying attention. The students, her dad, Maya...And it had been such an obvious solution: go with Charlie to the Spring Fling and it will be obvious that there's nothing between her and Lucas. But she couldn't do that to Charlie. Riley couldn't use someone like that, and found herself saying no.

The rest of the day...well, she'll never say it if anyone asks, but it sucks. All she wants to do now that she's home is throw herself into bed, curl up and feel sorry for herself, but she can't. There's no time. She has homework for several classes, she still needs to unpack her things from the trip and she's certain that at some point there's going to be a talk with her parents.

Riley decides to unpack first. Her mind just isn't in the right place for homework, nor does she want to think about what a conversation with her parents about this might look like. She turns on music, cranking the volume to try and drown out her thoughts, and sets to work.

With her bag on her bed, she opens it up and starts sorting through her clothes. Things she wore get tossed towards her hamper for laundry, things she didn't are placed in a pile up at the head of her bed where she can put them away later. Only a minute or so into her work Riley hears a soft knock at the window. She turns just in time to see her visitor crawling in.

"I hope you don't mind me stopping by. I just wanted to make sure you were OK."

Riley turns the music off and quickly scans the clothes that she's been tossing around, making sure that there's nothing too embarrassing visible before she replies. "I'll be fine. I mean...we learned a while ago not to listen to all that stuff, so..."

Lucas comes further into the room while she speaks until he's standing just in front of her."But this is a lot more than just some insecure bully, Riley. And you've got a lot going on besides that. It's OK if you're not OK."

"I'll be fine." Riley repeats. Her voice wavers, but she swallows and does her best to force some energy and confidence into it. "Maya's mad, but she knows me. She knows I wouldn't do anything like what they're saying. I'm sure if we let things calm down she'll come around. Just like you were saying yesterday." Despite her best efforts, she still has wipe at her eyes to brush a few tears away; she's not gonna break down and cry about this in front of anyone, but especially not Lucas.

"If you're sure...I just don't want you to think that you have to be."

For a moment as they stare at each other, Riley considers changing her mind and talking to him. Lucas is always so supportive and comforting; the best she's felt since this whole mess started was sitting out on the hammock with him. It feels like they've been having the same conversation over and over again while he tries to get her to talk and she tries to convince everyone that things are fine and will get better with just a little bit of time, and that's just one more thing that's circling around in her head making her feel sick. Maybe if she gives up the charade with him, it actually will get a little easier. Is it so wrong if she wants to be totally honest with _someone_? Even if it's just to be selfish and get a little comfort?

But then she sees the warmth in his eyes, nearly melts, and just as quickly realizes that being honest with him is going to lead exactly down the wrong path. She's just not strong enough right now to be around that and not fall right into his arms (and based on what's happened between them already there's very little question in her mind that something along those lines _will_ happen). She turns back around, setting back to work at sorting through her things. "Lucas, I really appreciate what you're trying to do, but you can't keep cornering me for these private conversations."

"Well you're not talking to me at school."

"Eventually someone's gonna notice and think that something's going on." Riley continues as though Lucas hadn't just said anything.

"They _already_ think that something's going on." Lucas moves next to her. "Pushing the rest of us away isn't gonna change that."

"I just don't want to-..." Riley drops off as she pulls the next item of clothing out of her bag, turning the worn material over in her hands. For a moment she can't figure out what it's even doing in her bag but then she remembers how upset she had been the morning before and how haphazardly she had packed. "Sorry." A nervous smile creeps up her lips. She turns and holds it out for him. "I didn't know I still had this."

Lucas' eyes go from her hers, to her hands back to her face. "Is that my sweatshirt?"

The nervous smiles gives way to a blush. "Yeah. I'd offer to wash it for you but I'm not sure when I'll be able to get it back to you if I do."

"You should keep it." Lucas pushes her hand back towards her, smiling. "I'm sure it looks better on you anyways." His phone chimes in his pocket and he pulls it out to glance at the display. "That's my dad. He wants me home early for a family dinner thing. I should probably get going. Call me if you need anything?"

Riley nods, even though she knows she won't do any such thing. "Yeah, of course."

"Then I'll see you at school tomorrow."

"See you then."

Lucas leaves, ducking back out the bay window onto the fire escape and Riley falls back so she's sitting on the bed, his sweatshirt still in hand. It's not the reassuring end to the day that she had been hoping for. Things feel even more uncertain than before, what with the school going crazy and these secret back-and-forths with Lucas...she doesn't have any idea what it even means that he's telling her to keep the sweatshirt when they both agreed that they can only be friends. And even though she's sure her parents will want to talk to her about all of this, especially when her dad gets home and tells her mom the gossip circulating around the school, she has no idea how to begin to talk about this with anyone, let alone her parents.

Forget getting her homework done or even unpacking, Riley needs to find a way to get her head on straight before she deals with anyone else. Without even really thinking about it, she slips into the sweatshirt and lies back across the bed, staring up at her ceiling and wondering what on earth it is that comes next.


	4. Chapter 4

"Auggie, I'm gonna order the pizza. Why don't you go ahead and pick out a couple movies for us to watch?"

Riley pulls open their drawer of take-out menus in the kitchen while Auggie runs to the living room and starts rifling through to find her favorite pizza place. Her parents have just left for an evening out with Uncle John and his wife and she's babysitting. Riley had been quick to volunteer; it's not like she has anywhere else to be on a Saturday night.

She's doing her best not to think about it, but it's been three weeks since they got back from Texas and so far, nothing has improved. Well, the bulk of the gossip has died down to just the occasional catty comment, but things with Maya are as broken as ever. Maya's barely looking at her and Lucas, let alone talking to them and because Farkle and Zay aren't interested in actually being caught in the middle (nor would Riley want them to be) all they'll say is that she hasn't wanted to talk about it. Riley's starting to doubt if just letting things be is still the best strategy, but she's trying to stay positive. After all, she checks every day and Maya is still wearing her ring.

Besides which, she's not sure where she would even begin if she wanted to try actively fixing things instead of waiting for them to get better. She had been sure that she was doing the right thing in Texas, but that had gone so horribly wrong. If that's what happened when she was confident, what kind of trouble could she cause when she feels so unsure?

Riley pulls out the menu and double checks the amount of cash her parents left to make sure it's enough to cover their usual night in order and a tip for the driver. She's starting to dial when Auggie returns, dropping three DVDs on the table. "We're only gonna have time for two of those before you have to go to bed." She warns.

"I know." Auggie nods. " _The Muppet_ s is an alternate."

"Why would you need an alternate?"

"Well," he starts matter-of-factly, sitting down and spreading the DVDs out across the surface, "my first choice is _Monsters Inc,_ because it's a total classic."

"Of course."

"And for my second movie, I wanted to pick _The Princess Bride_ , but I wasn't sure if I should. I didn't want to make you sad."

Riley lowers her phone, frowning. "That's a great movie. Why would it make me sad?"

"Because you always used to watch it with Maya." Auggie says. "And I know she hasn't been around much lately because you had a fight. Mom said I'm not supposed to ask you about it."

Riley fumbles to find her seat. She had no idea that Auggie was noticing that things were going on with them, or that he's worrying about it enough to try and change his behavior for her...The mixture of feeling loved by her little brother and feeling terrible for letting things get this far ends up leaving her unsettled. "Did you _want_ to ask me about it?"

"Kinda." Auggie shrugs. "You've never been so mad at each other that Maya stopped coming over."

No, they haven't. Especially not for weeks at a time. And Riley can't lie and say that she hasn't been feeling the impact. Maya's always been her go-to person for everything—advice, ranting, rambling excitedly...Riley just can't do most of that with the guys, for all that they've offered, and as much as she loves her friends on the cheer squad, she's not close enough with most of them to really open up. She's thought about talking to her mom (this is absolutely _not_ the sort of thing she wants to explain to her dad) but at the end of the day she doesn't know where to start and isn't sure that her mom can do anything anyways, so she hasn't bothered. "Well...she's not very happy with something that I did. And we both said some not-so-nice things. So we're taking a little break while we calm down and when we're ready we'll sit down somewhere and talk things through."

"So I don't need to track her down and talk some sense into her?"

The look on Auggie's face is so serious Riley can't help but giggle. "Why would you think you need to do that?"

"Uncle Josh told me that one of my jobs as your brother is if someone hurts you or makes you upset that I'm supposed to talk to them so they don't do it again."

"That's really sweet, Auggie, but that's not your job." And it's so many kinds of wrong message to give her little brother. Riley makes a mental note to have a talk with her Uncle about what he's been teaching Auggie; she doesn't want him thinking like that and she knows her mom wouldn't be happy.

"But if I don't do that, how can I help?"

Riley reaches across the table and grabs Auggie's hand. "Being nice like this just because you noticed something was wrong and didn't want to make it worse, makes you the best little brother I could ask for."

"I can do that." Auggie nods. "But.." He trails off, biting his lip and briefly looking off to the side. "What about the other stuff?"

She shakes her head. "What other stuff?"

"Josh gave me a whole list of things a brother needs to do."

The weight of relief that lifts off her chest is immense and Riley can't help but sigh. For a moment she had been sure that Auggie had noticed some of things that she's been trying to keep from everyone, like sneaking coffee in the mornings to make up for a lack of sleep. The last thing she would want to do is ask Auggie to lie for her, but she might have had to; if her parents knew about that stuff there's no telling how worried they'd be, and she knows they've been worrying plenty over what her dad's heard at school.

"I'll tell you what," she says, reaching for her phone. She slides off of her seat to stand. "Let me call and get the pizza, and then we'll put _Monsters Inc._ in. While the previews are running, you can tell me all about Josh's list and I'll tell you if it's something you should worry about. Deal?"

Auggie hops to his feet and gathers up the movies. "Deal."

"Oh and before we do that, can I get a hug from the world's best little brother?"

* * *

"Thanks for coming in early to meet with me, Mr. Matthews." Lucas had needed to set a special alarm to get to school on time for the Wednesday morning meeting, but since it was the easiest time for them to meet privately, he was more than willing.

"I'll always make time for the concerns of my students, Lucas. And you were fairly adamant in your texts."

"I just don't know what to do about this whole thing with Maya and Riley. They're still not talking."

"Why don't we take a seat?"

Lucas sits in one of the front desks of the history classroom, the one that Riley usually occupies, sliding his bag off of his shoulder. He's surprised when his teacher takes the adjacent desk instead of his seat by the blackboard and angles to face him more clearly.

"So...what exactly makes you think that _you_ need to do anything about what's going on with Maya and Riley?"

"I just...feel responsible." Lucas sighs. He leans forward in his seat and starts talking, letting go of the filter he's been using to keep everything in and avoid making things worse. "None of this would have happened if I had just been clearer from the beginning about my feelings. Riley and I were taking things slow and I was good with that but we weren't really talking and I just assumed that everything was good and everyone got it, but apparently it wasn't and they didn't.

"Riley only did what she did because I didn't notice that she was starting to worry about things and reassure her, and if she had never done that then Maya wouldn't be upset with her. And even if she had still done it, the only reason Maya's so upset now is because maybe I wasn't as nice as I could have been when I told her I didn't like her like that.

"So now, neither of them are happy. They're not talking, everything's a mess and I have...absolutely no idea how to fix things or even just get them to talk to each other again."

Mr. Matthews waits several beats after he finishes before speaking. "Lucas, fixing things between Riley and Maya is not your responsibility. What happened between them wasn't your fault; nobody expects someone your age to just know what's bothering someone, or how to let someone down gently. Honestly, this is something that's been building for a while."

Wait, what? Lucas trusts Mr. Matthews, but what does he mean, this has been building for a while? Riley and Maya were incredibly close and happy, right up until the rodeo. How was this not involved with what happened? "I don't understand."

"You're incredibly perceptive for someone your age, but there are some things that you just can't notice until you've been through them. Riley and Maya have been dealing with some growing pains in their friendship for a while now, and what happened in Texas was just the straw that broke the camel's back." Mr. Matthews explains.

"So...what are we supposed to do? They're falling apart. Riley is..." Lucas drops off, realizing that it's better to put his filter back in place. He's not sure what Mr. Matthews knows (even if he knows that he'll be worried about Riley regardless) but he knows that Riley will be upset if he says the wrong thing.

"Riley's not doing so great with it." Mr. Matthews nods. "I know. But we can't force them to do anything. They both have to want to talk and fix things. All you can do is keep doing what you've been doing. Support them both. Be there if they want to talk or need someone to lean on. Either they'll decide that the friendship is worth working to save or they'll have to move on."

* * *

"And remember, your final exam will be an in class essay. I'm not going to tell you the question but you will be expected to use examples from at least three books we have read to answer it so now is the time to start reviewing what we've covered this year." Harper says from her place, sitting cross-legged atop her desk. "I will see you all tomorrow. Riley, would you stay for a moment, please?"

Riley stops gathering her things. She can guess what this will be about. The same thing Mr. Norton and her math teacher wanted to talk about earlier in the week. _'Ms. Matthews, I know it's tempting with the end of the year so close to forgo your schoolwork in favor of having fun with your friends and celebrating, but with high school coming up you really need to consider putting in the effort to finish strongly.'_ It's just one more thing to grin and bear her way through to get through the day. She's getting quite used to it.

It's not that she can't appreciate what her teachers are trying to do (she's not exactly happy with her sliding grades either) but her poor performance isn't for lack of trying. Things just haven't been coming together as well for her when there's so much other stuff on her mind and it doesn't help to have everyone pointing it out.

"I'll wait for you out in the hall." Lucas says as he walks past and briefly places a hand on her shoulder.

"Thanks." Riley acknowledges him but doesn't look away from the cover of her notebook, covered in the crossed out doodles from earlier in the year. If she doesn't look up, then she doesn't have to see Maya still gathering up her things; she doesn't have to feel guilty for accepting the touch and reveling in the simple comfort. Lucas leaves after only a moment, and then she's stuck waiting for the rest of the class to filter out before she can speak again, trying to get out ahead of Harper's lecture. "I know I've fallen behind on the reading and haven't been participating as much lately Miss Burgess. I've just been a little distracted lately, but I promise I'm gonna work on turning things around to do better for the end of the year. I'm really sorry."

Harper uncrosses her legs and slides off the front of her desk. "Well, I appreciate that, Riley. But your recent performance isn't what I was hoping to speak to you about."

Riley's heart thuds against her rib cage. She can't think of anything else she's done that a teacher would want to talk to her about and her mind starts racing, wondering how much trouble she's going to be in. She knows Harper likes Maya, so maybe this is an intervention to tell her that she's being unfair to her by staying so close to Lucas. Maybe the school thinks all of this drama and gossip is too distracting and this is the warning that she has to do something to fix it. Or maybe her dad's so disappointed in her over all of this that he couldn't stand to talk to her himself and he asked Harper to do it.

"I've noticed over the past few weeks that you haven't really seemed like yourself." Harper says, turning one of the desks next to Riley's so it's facing her and taking a seat. "You brought up your academic performance, but you've also been much more withdrawn, less confident...I spoke with some of your other teachers, and they have similar concerns."

The simultaneous relief of not being in actual trouble and worry over what on earth she's supposed to say to this leaves Riley reeling. The sweaty palms and dry mouth of her nervousness can't even go anywhere because she knows saying the wrong thing might mean toppling the house of cards she's been living in the past few weeks. For the moment, she doesn't say anything. It's better to wait to hear an actual question so you know exactly what you have to say, instead of just talking and maybe giving something away that you don't have to; if Maya were talking to her, Riley could thank her for that particular lesson.

"I know you have a lot going on right now, with getting ready to transition to high school and the conflict between yourself and Maya...I just wanted to check in and make sure that you know that if you need someone to talk to, there are people here for you. There's myself, Miss Oben...We all want to see you happy, and feeling good."

There's no question. What does she say? How can she be careful about what she says if she doesn't know what Harper is looking for?

Riley has to fight the urge to bite her lip or tap her fingernails on the desk. It's one thing that her teachers have noticed her grades slipping, but that they've noticed the other things… She's been working so hard to stand tall and face every day with a smile like she always has and it's just not fair that it's not working. The whole point of being fine is so that people won't worry about her and they'll focus on taking care of Maya when she can't; they're not supposed to notice or care about her.

But apparently it's not just Lucas and Farkle and Auggie who are seeing through her facade. It's her teachers. Which means it's probably her dad, which means it's only a matter of time before she _does_ have to face some sort of discussion on that end, and Riley knows that she can't deal with that right now. She can't handle the guilt of being the cause of Maya's heartache and hiding all of these things from her parents, or the worry that one wrong word is going to turn someone else away from her, and all of those things are going to come crashing together if she has to have that conversation.

The only thing to do is amp things up and nip this in the bud. Maybe if she can convince Harper that there's nothing to worry about, Harper will pass the message along.

"No." Riley tries to let a smile rise on her face, not too quickly, because that would look fake, but not too slowly either because then Harper will still worry. "I mean, I'm fine. I haven't been so focused lately, but it's the whole end of the year thing." Harper will buy that, won't she? All the other teachers seemed to. "I'm already working on fixing it."

Harper frowns. "Right, but like I said, this isn't about your grades, Riley. This is about you. I'm concerned about how you're feeling."

"And I just told you. I'm feeling fine." Riley shakes her head. "There's nothing to be concerned about. I've been a little tired lately, that's all. And yeah, it's not very fun not having Maya with me, but it's not like she's my only friend or anything. And we're on our way to working things out." A small lie won't hurt here. It's definitely for the greater good. "It won't be long before things are back to normal, and then everything will be fine."

Harper opens her mouth to say something else, but hesitates and changes her mind. Riley watches as her teacher seems to swallow her frown and switch back to a gentle smile. "If you're sure. Just remember if that changes, or if something new comes up...even if you just want to talk, we're here."

"I know." She looks down and starts reorganizing her pile of books to avoid the hanging awkwardness. It's obvious that Harper doesn't totally believe her but doesn't want to call her out either. Riley's not sure what that means for her future, but worse than anything else it just feels weird. She just wants to get out of the room and breathe some air where it doesn't feel like she's somehow letting everyone down just by doing what she can to stay functional.

"Then, I'm all set if you are. Go ahead and head out."

Riley doesn't need to be told twice. She gathers up her things and stands, wishing Harper a good rest of the day before she exits the room. The hallway is mostly empty with kids being in a rush to get to lunch, but as he had promised, Lucas is leaning against the wall outside of the classroom waiting for her. As she walks past, he straightens and starts walking next to her.

"Everything OK?" They start down the hall towards their lockers, where they can stash their things before heading to the cafeteria.

"Yeah." Riley barely even thinks before answering. "She just wanted to check in. I told her everything's fine and she let me go."

"Why would you do that?"

"Do what?"

"Tell her that everything's fine, when it's clearly not."

"Because there's nothing that she can do to change that, even if I did tell her." Nobody else seems to get that. They all keep trying to get her to talk and confess how much she misses Maya and how terrible things are now, and they _are_ terrible, but there's no actual point to it. Nobody can make Maya ready to come back and hear an apology. Nobody can snap their fingers and make everyone happy again. Riley can't just put herself through that.

She's kept things to herself to keep the focus off of her, yes, but she's also been staying quiet because as long as she doesn't talk about it, she can stay strong; the second she opens up and lets herself actually start feeling how bad everything is, she just knows there won't be any closing that door, and if they're going to get through this, she needs to still be strong.

"Talking to people isn't just about fixing things, Riley." Lucas says as they reach his locker. Zay is next door at his, typing something on his phone. "Sometimes it's just about getting things off your chest."

"My chest is just fine."

Zay's head snaps up, eyes wide. "Really now?"

Lucas glares. "That's not what she meant."

Riley clutches her books closer to her chest, and tries to breathe away her embarrassment at making such a stupid comment. Her cheeks stay fiercely warm, and she carefully avoids finding Zay's eyes, focusing on Lucas instead. "I just meant that I know I have people to talk to if I need to, but I don't need to. I'm OK. And I'm stronger than everyone seems to think I am."

"Oh we've seen you when you're mad." Zay comments. "We know you're plenty strong." When Lucas shoots him another pointed look he raises his eyebrows incredulously. "How is that not helping?"

Lucas sighs and turns back to Riley. "I know you're strong, Riley. But accepting help from someone that can tell you're struggling despite that strength doesn't make you weak. And it doesn't mean Maya or anybody else won't get help if they need it."

It's just not fair that he always knows what to say and how to say it. Lucas gets that warm look in his eyes and it's all Riley can do not to just crumble into his arms. She barely remembers to toe her own line and maintain stability. "I promise, if things get worse I'll consider it, but I really am OK. Just a little tired."

"Thank you." He goes to slide his things into his locker. "I'm sorry if it seems like I'm bugging you about this stuff, it's just really hard to watch you try and deal with all of this on your own when I know you're upset." He turns back. "I really care about you, Riley." He reaches out to tuck her hair back from her face, but Riley instinctively takes a step back just as his fingertips brush against her cheek (they're in the hall where anyone can see, after all) and instead of the nice gesture she gets to watch Lucas' eyes briefly darken before he sighs once more. "I just wish you'd let me show it every once in a while."

Lucas closes his locker and leaves towards the cafeteria, leaving Riley dumbfounded. She hasn't done anything that she hasn't done fifty times since they got back from Texas. Why is he upset now?

But this is exactly why she hasn't been talking to people; it only takes the smallest thing to bother someone, and most of the time you don't even know what it might be. Now another friend is walking away from her—the only friend she's been able to call exclusively hers and not have to worry about influencing through this whole mess—and she has no idea what she did or if he'll come back. Watching him walk down the hall it's like there's a bucket of ice water being poured over her. She has to dig her nails into her arms just to keep herself from falling.

Then Zay sidles up next to her and slings an arm over her shoulder, snapping her back to reality. "You know, Sugar, you're only making things harder on yourself with this whole, just friends routine with Lucas." He starts walking her further down the hall towards her locker.

"It's not a routine. We _are_ just friends."

"Sure you are."

She doesn't have to even look to know that Zay' is rolling his eyes. "We are."

"Sugar, if all the two of you were is friends, you'd let him act like it."

Riley steps out from under his arm, stops and stares at him. "What are you talking about?"

"Friends comfort each other. They talk, they hold hands, they do all sorts of things that you don't let Lucas do. It's like you're trying to build a giant, anti-feelings wall between you two, and all it's doing is making you both more miserable than you already are. I know he said you two agreed not to act on your feelings because of the Maya thing, but it's not like things are getting better on that front. I just think it would be easier on you guys if you at least helped each other by being honest."

"What? Be honest by getting together?"

Zay shrugs. "Why not?"

How can he even ask that? Doesn't he get what that would do? Riley frowns. "Because if Lucas and I get together, that's completely disregarding Maya's feelings. It's not fair to her and totally selfish and if we act like that then things won't get better and she'll be right to never forgive us."

"Yeah, but things aren't getting better now. And at least if you and Lucas do your thing, you two could help each other instead of drowning on your own."

Riley starts walking. She's not that hungry, but at the rate she's going she's not even going to make it to lunch. "Sometimes to make a friendship work you have to make tough choices. What you do, who you talk to...that's all a part of that. I'm just trying to make my friendship work."

Zay grabs her arm gently, spinning her back around. "That's all well and good but it only works if both people are trying. And from what I've seen Maya hasn't been making any tough choices. You might have to consider that she's not as interested in fixing things as you are."

"Go to lunch Zay." Riley says, yanking her arm back from his grasp. There's no way that Maya doesn't want to fix things...she's just a little slow to get over being upset; she always has been. Riley won't even consider the possibility that Maya doesn't want to get over it. She can't. "I'm not giving up on Maya."

* * *

Topanga never thought she'd have to sit down with Riley to talk about her academic performance. Riley is smart and a complete rule-follower so it's not like they've ever had to worry about her skipping out on doing her work. And she and Cory have always agreed that as long as she works hard, it's OK if she gets a bad grade; low scores are only a problem if they're because she's given up, and they never imagined a scenario where Riley would do that.

It seems now that she has though, so here they are. Topanga is chatting with Riley on her own while Cory and Auggie go over his school day out in the living room; Cory doesn't want Riley to feel like it's her teacher attacking her, and given that they pretty much know the origin of her sliding grades (Topanga definitely should have given the girls a talk about how vacations and school trips enhance feelings before they left for Texas) it seems like the discussion might take a turn down a path where Riley will only want her mom present anyways.

Only so far, all that Topanga is getting out of her is apologies, vague excuses, and promises to try harder, which isn't the goal. The plan was to start with a discussion of her grades and hopefully Riley would finally start to open up about the estrangement between her and Maya. All Topanga knows is essentially what Cory's been able to glean from the gossip at school and what he's observed between them. If the John Quincy Adams rumor mill is anything like the John Adams rumor mill, everything there needs to be taken with a grain of salt, but she doesn't like what he's been hearing and she definitely doesn't like what he's been seeing, or what she's seen from her daughter when she's at home. It's obvious that Riley isn't doing well, but Topanga has no idea how to help when she won't talk to her.

Topanga is trying to come up with a relevant personal example in the hopes that if she opens up first it will convince Riley that it's OK to do the same when there's a brief knock on Riley's door. It swings open barely a moment later and Cory's standing there, pale as a sheet and waving her over. Topanga excuses herself from the bay window and steps into the hall with him. "What's wrong?"

"Josh just called." He answers, running a hand over his hair. "My parents were in a car accident."

Her hand flies to her chest. "Oh my...are they OK? How bad is it?"

"He said the doctors can't tell him a lot yet. Just that for the moment they're stable but in critical condition. I need to get down to Philly."

"Of course. Go." Topanga's mind races, figuring out the best solution. She needs to be there for him and the rest of the family (Amy and Alan are just as much her parents at this point) but Auggie would be underfoot and possibly quite upset if he were to come and even though Riley could probably handle the actual hospital visit and will want to come, unless it looks like something genuinely terrible is going to happen, the responsible thing would be for her to stay in the city and continue to go to school. Her grades can't afford to take another hit, and it's so close to the end of the year that missing a lot of days isn't a very good option anyways. Topanga quickly decides that unless Cory objects, or they get an update that things look bad, both of the kids should stay in the city and they can join them in Philly over the weekend when the situation has settled some.

"You get going. I'll take care of telling Auggie and Riley, and make arrangements for them and then I'll come join you."

"Make arrangements…?" She fills him in on her plan, and though he looks completely overwhelmed by the entire scenario, he does agree.

"I'll get things straightened out and join you as soon as I can. Go take care of your brother and find out what's going on."

* * *

Apologies for the slight cliffhanger. I'll try to be quick about the next update.


	5. Chapter 5

Hey, everyone. I don't normally use author's notes for much more than thanking everyone for reading, reviewing, and subscribing (thanks for all of that by the way) but something happened with this story that I feel like I have to address. Last week I found out thanks to a considerate reader that someone had taken this story and posted it as their own on another site.

I was thankfully able to get it taken down without much fuss, but I was really hurt to hear that it happened in the first place and very frustrated. I put a lot of effort into writing, and I love being a part of this fandom. That one person's actions could turn something great into a negative experience quite frankly sucks. I consider myself very lucky that all of this was resolved so quickly, but it's still shaken me a bit. I really hope this was a one time thing and that nobody else in the fandom has to deal with anything like it. It's not fun or flattering, it just hurts to have something you're proud of taken away from you.

Anyway, with the soapbox ranting over and done with, I'll thank you all again for reading and letting me know what you think, and let you get on with Chapter 5.

* * *

 _Hey, if you're still talking to me I wanted to apologize for—_ Riley stops typing her text message, shaking her head as she deletes the contents and starts over. _I'm sorry for pulling away earlier. I haven't been very fair to-_

Her mom bursts back into the room nearly ten minutes after her dad had beckoned her out, looking slightly frenzied and almost as though she's been crying.

Riley freezes. Something bad must have happened for her mom to look this upset. Topanga Matthews is always so in control of herself, even when she's in crisis mode. It's one of the many things Riley has always admired about her mom, and has always hoped she could figure out how to do. For something to have shaken her mom enough that she can notice...it has to be serious. Riley closes the text without sending it, setting her phone aside. "Mom?"

"Riley, hon, I need you to pack a bag." Her mom says, tucking her phone back into her pocket. "I just got off the phone with Farkle's parents. You're going to spend a couple of nights at his place."

"What? Why? What's wrong?"

Her mom sits next to her, back in the bay window seat. "Uncle Josh just called from Philadelphia. There's been an accident. Your grandparents are in the hospital."

Riley's heart seems to stutter at the news. She knows she's still breathing but for a moment her head seems to be lifting away from her body. It comes crashing back down as she realizes that her mom is still talking and she gradually tunes back in.

"-already on his way. He's going to call if anything changes, but it'll probably be a while before there's an actual update."

"Why aren't we going to Philly?" Riley interjects the moment her mom pauses. She doesn't understand why they aren't going with her dad. If your family needs you, you go. And family being in the hospital definitely means they need you. "If grandma and grandpa are hurt, we should be there too."

"We're going to be. I'm heading down as soon as I drop you and Auggie off at the Minkus' and then you two will take the train down this weekend."

"This weekend?" Riley's mind races. It's only Wednesday night. The weekend is two whole days away. That's too long. What if something happens? What if the weekend is too late? From how her mom is talking and the way she seems to be rushing to make plans this was a serious accident, and Riley's not so optimistic that she can ignore what that means. "No. I want to go down with you."

"Sweetie, your dad and I agree that you and Auggie need to stay here for a couple of days until things calm down. There's nothing you'll be able to do at the hospital, and you can't afford to miss school right now."

Riley is quick to protest. "I could visit them. And I don't care about school. Grandma and Grandpa are more important than my grades."

Her mother sighs and loops an arm around Riley's shoulders. "I'm not saying they aren't, Riley. But they're in critical condition. Most hospitals won't let someone your age in to visit in that wing. And they definitely won't let Auggie. It will be better for everyone, including you, if you guys wait up here until we know more."

Riley feels her indignation and intensity deflate as her mom talks. Logic takes over and everything starts getting replaced with growing worry. "But what if something happens? What if they..." She trails off, unable to finish the thought. It's too terrible to say out loud.

"If anything changes, good or bad, we'll let you know." Her mom promises. "That's one of the reasons I asked Stuart if you could stay with them. He can get you two to Philly fast if he needs to. Hopefully he won't, but the option is there."

Riley's not sure if that's supposed to make her feel better or worse. In theory, she supposes, it's a good a thing, but all her mind is really registering is how terrifying it is that they needed to think of that option, let alone that they might have to use it. Her grandparents are hurt, so badly that she's not allowed to see them and she's going to be stuck in another city waiting for news. That things could take a turn and they could die is a legitimate possibility...Riley can't figure out how her mother is still functioning.

"I have to go talk to your brother and help him pack. Are you OK to get your things together?" Riley nods. "OK. You'll have your key so you'll be able to pop in if you forget something but try to get all your school stuff and what you'll need for a few days away." Riley nods again. "I really appreciate that you're being so strong and understanding about this, Sweetie." Her mother starts to pull her into a squeezing embrace. "It's a load off my mind to know that you're able to handle this and will be there for Auggie while we're away."

It's not until Riley's mom rests her head on top of hers and Riley feels the tears start falling down into her hair that she realizes as sick as she feels, and as much as it seems like she's gasping for air and sobbing, she's actually breathing normally. Not a single tear is falling.

* * *

"There, see?" Riley sets her phone on the bedside table after ending a phone call with her mom, and wraps her arm around Auggie. Her little brother is still sniffling, having woken up alone in a strange place and only remembering that something horrible had happened, leaving him unsure of what was going on and completely terrified. She'd had to abandon getting ready for school to comfort and reassure him and in the end had resorted to calling her mom when she was unsuccessful. "Everything's the same as when we went to bed last night. Nothing bad's happened."

Auggie rubs at his face with the back of his hand. "Grandma and Grandpa are in the hospital."

"Besides that." Riley concedes. She ignores the pang in her heart from bypassing that fact, instead searching for a way to finish the process of consoling Auggie. "But it's a good thing that the doctors haven't told us anything else. That means Grandma and Grandpa are working really hard to get better and be OK." Or that things are really bad and the doctors are just too busy to update anyone. Or they did update them but it's not good news and her mom didn't know how to tell them. But Riley doesn't say any of that. They have an honesty policy in the Matthews household when it comes to Auggie about giving him truthful, whole information when he asks for it, but he's already so worried that Riley doesn't have the heart to make it worse. "Now, you should have breakfast before you get dressed for school."

"I'm not hungry."

"Really? That's too bad. Because I happen to know they're making waffles." Because Farkle's mom had asked for their favorites the night before and Riley had rattled off all of Auggie's. "And they have a lot of really good toppings to choose from. Maple syrup...strawberries and cream...Nutella..."

Auggie pulls away and sits up, scooting off the edge of the bed. "Maybe I have room for a few bites."

"Good. I have to finish getting ready. Do you remember how to get down to the kitchen?" As Riley had been the first time she had seen the Minkus home, Auggie had been overwhelmed by the sheer size of the place upon their arrival; between that and his mind being elsewhere, she has no idea how much of the tour Farkle had given has actually stuck.

Auggie confirms the directions and after one more encouragement from Riley takes off in search of his meal. Riley, in turn, gets off the bed, grabs her phone, and returns to the guest room down the hall (hers only in name since she had ended up spending the night with Auggie when he had trouble sleeping) to finish getting ready. She's already dressed as she doesn't bother closing the door, just sets herself in front of a mirror to do something with her hair. It's still wet from her shower and hanging limp and stringy around her face, but thanks to the interruption from Auggie she doesn't really have time to take a blow dryer to it or really fix it.

Riley settles on braiding it, and pulls a couple hair ties from the handle of her brush. She slips them around her wrist and starts brushing her hair, managing only a few strokes before someone raps their knuckles on the door frame. Riley glances back and sees Farkle, dressed for the day with his bag slung over one shoulder. "Come on in." She goes back to her hair.

"I just saw Auggie on his way to get breakfast." Farkle drops his bag by the door and walks in, shoving his hands in his pockets and leaning against the wall near the mirror she's using. "He seems better than he was half an hour ago."

"We ended up calling my mom for an update. So that calmed him down."

"Good news?"

Riley shakes her head. "No news. But I explained that that _was_ good news."

"Is it?"

"I don't know. Maybe. But you saw how worried he was. I had to tell him _something_."

"He'll be fine as soon as you hear they're going to be OK." Farkle assures. "And his teacher knows what's going on, right?"

There's so much running around in Riley's head—tasks that she's responsible for in taking care of Auggie, things that need to happen regardless of who does them, things that might happen and what-ifs—that it takes her a moment to locate the answer to Farkle's question. "I think your mom is going to talk to her when she drops him off."

"Then I'm sure she'll take good care of him until you hear something."

Riley wishes she could take Farkle's reassurances to heart and relax a little (at least about Auggie) but as with all the words and offerings that people have been giving her they just seem to settle across her shoulders. One more platitude to carry throughout her day. She's coming off as calm and confident, but inside it feels like she's being pulled in a hundred different directions and she's screaming and crying and begging for it to stop or for somebody to help her only everything just keeps pulling harder; Riley can't understand why the chaos hasn't broken through to the surface, but every time she thinks about saying something, no words come. She just murmurs a half-hearted agreement and continues braiding her hair.

"And we'll take care of you, OK?" He continues. "Me, Lucas, Zay..whoever you need. I know you're being strong for Auggie right now but you don't need to keep that up all the time."

Riley ties off the braid and shakes her head. If she agrees, he'll only expect something to happen later. "Thanks, but-,"

"No. No buts, Riley." Farkle protests. "You're always there when one of us needs something. You need to let us be there for you once in a while."

"I-,"

Farkle powers on like she hadn't just started to say something. "I've let it go for weeks because I know you've been trying to make sure we don't get caught up in this thing between you and Maya, but it stops today. You have family members in the hospital. Maya will understand if you take a little extra support because of that."

Riley wants to explain why she has doubts of Maya's ability to understand the obvious through her anger (there has, after all, been no indication that Maya believes Riley isn't currently dating Lucas) or that she's not even being strong by choice at this point, but all that comes out is, "OK."

"And nobody's going to-," Farkle cuts himself off. Realization crosses his features but he tempers that just as quickly. "I mean, good." There's a brief pause and then, "If you still want to walk in we have to leave soon. Are you about ready?"

"Yeah." Riley glances in the mirror before she answers, even though she knows what she's going to see. She looks awful. Although she's never understood makeup as a confidence booster like her mom or Aunt Morgan, over the past few weeks she's recognized it's usefulness as a shield and a way to distract people; she's gotten very used to putting it on every morning to hide the dark circles under her eyes and make herself look generally healthier and more energetic. But in the rush of the night before, Riley had forgotten to pack hers, and she can't borrow from Farkle's mom. Aside from the fact that she knows what brand Jennifer uses and is pretty sure that the foundation alone costs more than her entire wardrobe, they just don't have the same coloring, so she'd probably end up looking sickly. Well...sicklier. She looks pretty terrible now, but at least she has a good reason and shouldn't have to put up with too many points and whispers.

"I just need to get my bag together."

"OK. I'll meet you downstairs in a minute."

Farkle leaves and Riley crosses the room to where she's left her overnight bag and backpack. She has to move the pajamas she wore the night before to she side to get to her bag and her hand lingers on the sweatshirt. Lucas' sweatshirt.

She knows it's stupid and childish and any number of things, but Riley has gotten in the habit of wearing the thing late at night when she's sitting in her bay window or curled up in bed and there's no chance of anyone seeing her. Even though Lucas told her to keep it, it still seems like anyone else who sees her with it are going to assume something is happening, or at the very least think it's weird. But Riley can't help herself. The sweatshirt is soft and warm and it's like having a small piece of Lucas' steady presence envelop her; after a long day of holding everything together it feels like the only piece of comfort she's allowed to give herself. Wearing it last night had been more of a risk, but Riley knows Auggie either doesn't understand the significance or doesn't care and while Farkle could figure it out if he saw, he probably wouldn't say anything.

One hand stays on the sweatshirt while she uses the other to check the contents of her bag. The only class she doesn't have today is math, so she pulls that book out, but she's still left with a backpack filled with textbooks and notebooks for classes that she's barely floating by in, even without this new distraction, and Riley can feel anxiety spreading across her chest and closing in, like somebody is shrink-wrapping her. Her list of things to get through is so long and she doesn't know where she'll be able to find the energy or strength. She just knows she has to.

Without really thinking, Riley crumples up the sweatshirt and shoves it into her bag before zipping the top, slinging it over her shoulder, and heading downstairs.

* * *

"Man, Riley looks terrible."

Lucas reflexively reaches over and slaps the back of his hand against Zay's chest before he even looks across the hall to where Riley is entering the school with Farkle. "Zay, her grandparents are in the hospital. They were in a major car accident yesterday." Riley is as pale as he's ever seen her, with dark circles under her eyes and tightly drawn features. Farkle had texted him about the situation the night before and again early this morning to let him know that there's been no news and that he's pretty sure she didn't sleep for a moment all night. Even taking that into consideration, Riley looks entirely worn out and done, more than Lucas would think possible in just one night.

"Oh, geez. Man, I had no idea."

"I know. Just cool it around her today, will you? She doesn't need any extra stress." Lucas swings his locker door shut and heads across the hall to meet them at Riley's locker. He greets them both, but quickly turns his focus to Riley. "Farkle told me about what happened to your grandparents."

She glances at Farkle. "He did?"

Farkle ignores her and Lucas decides to just say what he intended in the first place. "I know it's really rough, waiting for news like this. If you there's anything you need..."

"Thanks Lucas, but I'm fine."

"You're fine." He finishes the sentence with her. It's not like he hasn't heard the words come out of her mouth a thousand times in the last three weeks. "I know."

Riley swings her braided hair over one shoulder. "Honestly, I'm more worried about Auggie. He doesn't understand why we can't be down in Philly with everyone else. Our mom told him how serious it was before she left, so he's terrified that they're gonna die and he'll never see them again. And I've been trying to reassure him, and answer all his questions but I think I'm just making things worse."

"I'm sure you're not."

"I had to stay with him last night just so he would go to sleep." She says, turning away to start unloading her things into her locker. "And when he woke up this morning and I wasn't there, he started screaming and crying because he thought that something had happened and I had gone without telling him."

Farkle shifts the weight of his bag on his shoulder. "And I told you that's the situation, not anything you're doing. As soon as you get the news that everything's gonna be OK, and guys get down to Philly to see them, he'll be fine."

"I hope so." She turns back around.

"Anyway, if you're sure you're OK, I have to go drop off my stuff and talk to Mr. Norton about my final project."

Riley nods, brushing her hair away from her face again. "Of course. But...if you see Maya, can you let her know what's going on? She shouldn't hear all this secondhand."

Farkle agrees before he turns and leaves, and Lucas considers the request. Riley's concerned about Maya. Not herself. Maya. He knows that Riley still cares deeply for Maya, regardless of the gap that's grown between them, and that Maya considers most of Riley's family to be her family as well so it makes sense that she should be told about the elder Matthews' accident. But he can't fathom a scenario where if he was in Riley's position he'd even be able to think about anyone besides himself and his family, let alone put someone else first. He's not sure how she does it.

"Do you know who's going to be covering your dad's classes?" Lucas asks the question to fill the silence that pops up in Farkle's absence, but immediately regrets his topic choice. He's so desperate to avoid commenting on her compassion for Maya's role in the situation and potentially offending her that instead he says the next thing that springs to mind without giving any thought to the implications.

"Uh, I'm not sure." She answers, fiddling with her braid again. "Depending on who they got they might just send us to the library. They do that sometimes."

"I guess we'll find out after lunch. Do you want to head to art?" They still have close to ten minutes before the bell rings and they have to actually be in Miss Kossal's room, but Lucas is willing to suggest anything to get away from the cloud of awkward hanging over them. Talking had always been easy for them (apart from the early days of their friendship when they were still adjusting to the rush of butterflies and imagined scenarios that came whenever they saw each other—at least that was Lucas' excuse) but ever since Texas they've had a growing list of talking points that they're supposed to avoid and it's starting to put a strain on things.

Riley nods and closes her locker door. They start walking towards the art room, picking up Zay along the way. He offers his own words of support to Riley then, picking up on the uncomfortable atmosphere, offers up his own solution.

"So..." Zay draws out. "How 'bout them Yankees?"

Riley rolls her eyes, but the comment at least gets a conversation going (mostly between himself and Zay) about whether or not a team's spring training performance is really a good indicator of how their regular season is going to go. The talk goes on as they reach the art room and start gathering up materials for their current projects, pausing only to greet Miss Kossal behind her desk. Riley grabs her sketchpad from the shelf, sets it on the easel she's been using (Farkle has taken her spot with Maya, Zay has shifted to the middle and now she sits next to him) and then goes to the supply table to grab a set of oil pastels.

That's when Maya comes in and everything stops.

The blonde has tears in her eyes and when she sees Riley she freezes for a moment before rushing over. "Riley! Farkle just told me about your grandparents. Are you OK?" She wraps her arms around Riley in a hug, but it's either so tight or so unexpected that Riley just stands there. Lucas can't tell which, but it's crushing and uncomfortable to watch.

Maya doesn't even wait for Riley to answer her, just keeps talking as she disengages from the embrace. "We've been so stupid lately. I know you messed up, but we should still be talking. That's how you fix problems, right? You talk about them. We should do that."

Lucas can't believe what he's hearing. _Now_ Maya wants to talk? After weeks of awkward, heavy glances and practically ignoring Riley if they actually had to interact with each other in any way, she chooses _now_ to remember that having discussions instead of enacting the silent treatment is the mature way to deal with problems. Now, when Riley is so obviously not in the right head space to deal with anything so complicated. Not to mention the way she's talking, laying all the blame on Riley like that… He knows Riley made the initial mistake in Texas, just assuming what Maya would want and acting without taking to her first, but she's been doing everything she can to make amends within the boundaries set by Maya ever since. At some point, Maya has to take some responsibility too.

It's impossible to tell if Riley is equally bothered, or if she's OK with what's being said and happy that Maya's back trying to be her friend. She's just standing there, stock still and stiff, a blank expression on her face.

Just as with the non-reception of her hug, Maya doesn't seem to notice. "I can't really focus on my project and you at the same time, but what do you say we meet at lunch and talk things out?"

"Uh...yeah. Sure." Riley says after a long beat passes. She presses her lips together. "I'll meet you in the cafeteria."

"Great." Maya hugs her again, still getting no physical reaction from Riley. "See you then."

Zay and Lucas share a disbelieving look as Maya steps away, going through her own routine of gathering her things for the class. There's no way _that_ can be how this mess ends. Lucas wants a resolution, things haven't been the same with the whole group since the fracture happened, but if this is how it's going to take place...it's not worth it. Riley's side of things won't get heard—if he's reading her right this morning she can barely put her thoughts together, let alone handle such a complex talk when Maya's clearly feeling self-assured. It won't really work. It couldn't possibly.

Maya walks away and starts gathering her things for the class; Riley stays standing, stuck near the supply table. Lucas is going to go to her, to talk to her or at lease get her to sit down at her easel, but a few seconds later it's like she snaps to life and she walks over to Miss. Kossal's desk.

"Miss Kossal?" She starts quietly. "I know it's generally against school policy for us to have our phones on during class, but I'm waiting to hear some news about my grandparents...they were in a car accident last night and nobody's sure yet what's going to happen."

"Oh, of course." Miss Kossal nods. "Just put the volume on low, and if you get a call you step out into the hall quietly."

The call doesn't come during art class.

Lucas hears Riley make the request twice more. Once in English (where she doesn't get a call) and once in History (where the substitute couldn't care less what anyone in the class is doing as long as they're sitting at their desks and nobody's shouting and he's already allowed several people, like Farkle, to go to the library to work on the computers). He watches Riley answer the phone and go out into the hall, expecting her to come back a few minutes later either crying or incredibly happy and relieved. He goes back to reading the chapter that Mr. Matthews had been covering, but when he reaches the end of it twenty minutes later and she's still not back, he worries that the news was worse than expected and she can't even handle coming back to get her things.

He stands, gives the substitute a halfhearted request to grab something from his locker, and doesn't wait to hear an affirmative response before he walks out the door. He'll deal with the detention if it comes to that but he has to make sure that Riley is OK.

Thankfully, she's not very far at all. He finds her sitting on the bench in front of the girls' bathroom. She's not crying, which he might take as a good sign only she's definitely not smiling or happy either. She's just sitting there staring at her lap, phone resting limply in her hand.

"Riley?" He sits next to her. "Are you OK?"

It takes a second for Riley to register the question, and when she does her answer is soft and flat. "Yeah. I'm good."

Lucas doesn't want to call her a liar but she's quite clearly not good. Nothing about her posture, tone, or expression even comes close to resembling normal, happy Riley. He settles asking about the phone call. "Was that your mom on the phone?"

"Yeah."

"Well...what did she say?"

"My Grandpa is stable and improving but he hasn't woken up yet." She recites, fumbling a little over the terminology. "My grandma is going into surgery to fix something with her liver...if she makes it through that they think she'll probably be OK."

Lucas figures there has to be something else. To him that sounds like the sort of report he would want in a situation like this, but she doesn't seem happy or relieved in the slightest. "Those are good things, aren't they?"

"Yeah. It's really good news."

It still doesn't sound like it. He struggles to figure out a way to tell her that and several moments pass. He doesn't get there.

"Lucas, I think something's broken." Her voice is even softer, and she doesn't look up from her lap.

Broken? What does that mean, something's broken? Is she talking about her grandparents? Is _she_ hurt?

"In me." She adds. "I think something in me is broken."

"I don't under-,"

"I'm feeling so much that I think I could drown or die or explode from all of it, but I can't show any of it."

He knows she's been careful about schooling every reaction since Texas. She's focused more on looking fine than on actually being fine (not that they've found a good way to let her know that they've noticed). Lucas considers himself to be fairly familiar with the process. When things are particularly stressful or trying, he has any number of tricks that he runs through to keep himself calm until it's more appropriate to let everything out and they work, but they suck because it's _hard_ and _exhausting._ And he hasn't been dealing with half of what Riley has of late. It's no wonder she's feeling overdrawn.

"Riley, you don't have to worry about hiding that stuff from us." Lucas assures. He reaches over to take her hand. "We want to be there for you, no matter what you're feeling."

"No, I literally _can't_ show it. I can't cry." Riley finally turns to face him, and Lucas is struck by how deep her eyes seem. "I should be crying all the time but I can't...Last night when my mom told me what happened I was so upset and scared that I though for sure I was sobbing but I wasn't even blinking back tears. I'll feel the walls closing in like I can't breathe but I'm not actually struggling.

"And now things are sort of looking up. Maya finally wants to talk to me again and things look good for my grandparents...I should be relieved, maybe even happy, but it's like there's this wall and nothing gets past it. I can barely even talk and explain any of it I'm just..I'm finally the heartless witch everyone's been saying I am."

"What? No. Riley, you are the furthest person from heartless that I've ever met. You care so deeply about everyone...even people you don't know. That's not heartless." Riley doesn't respond and Lucas doesn't wait for the silence to grow over them. He can't begin to understand how she's feeling, or what it could possibly mean that she's having trouble showing any of it but even if all he can do is listen and reassure her he has to try. "And you're _not_ broken. There's nothing wrong with you. It doesn't matter if you're crying your eyes out or smiling or sitting there stone-faced; nobody can tell you the right way to react to anything and anyone who knows you knows that you're feeling something. _I_ know that you're feeling something."

"I don't understand how you can be so sure. I'm not even that sure."

"I'm sure because I know you. There's nothing heartless or broken about you, Riley. You're the most amazing girl I know. And if I have to remind you that every time I see you, I will. You're not going through any of this alone."

Riley leans against him, resting her head against his shoulder and Lucas gently maneuvers his arm, still holding on to her hand, to wrap around her shoulders. "How can you be so good to me when I've been such a mess lately?"

"Everyone's allowed to be a mess sometimes. Besides...didn't you hear me just now? You're the most amazing girl I know." Lucas tilts his head over and presses his lips against Riley's temple. "Being good to you is _very_ important to me."


	6. Chapter 6

Thank you for your patience. Thank you for reading, reviewing, favoriting, and subscribing. I love and appreciate everyone of you.

Also thank you to sand1128 for helping me workshop several pieces of this chapter.

* * *

"Must be nice."

The comment is the first one Maya makes other than meaningless small talk about the available lunch after they meet in the cafeteria, and it takes everything Riley has left in her not to stiffen at her cold tone. Where was the friend from the art room who had seemed so understanding? Or at least...open to talking?

When they had been sitting in the hallway, Lucas had cautioned her that she didn't have to deal with the Maya issue today; Maya was willing to put it off to focus on her art, which meant she should be allowed to put it off to focus on her family's health problems. The looming conversation was important, he asserted, and neither girl should go into it if they aren't feeling one hundred percent. But Riley had insisted.

She wants one less thing looming over her head and of the things she might actually be able to do something about it's either this or her grades. The way Riley sees it, she'll be able to focus on everything else much better if she can eliminate the rift with Maya, so even though she has a good out and some of Maya's comments worry her now that they've actually sunk in, Riley can't take it. The last thing she needs is for Maya to think that she doesn't care about fixing things. Not when it's already taken this long for Maya to be ready to talk.

So Riley's there. Sitting with Maya at an isolated corner table and wondering what's happened to change her friend's attitude.

"What does?"

Maya taps her fork against the edge of her tray. "Having a guy like Lucas to hold you when you have a bad day."

Oh. So Maya had been among the students that had seen her and Lucas in the hall, still leaning on each other and too slow to untangle when the bell had rung. Riley hadn't noticed her in the crowd, but supposes it makes sense that she was there, given her luck. Sure, they weren't technically doing anything wrong, it was just one friend helping another during a rough time, but she knows how it looks to everyone else. To Maya.

Riley hadn't been avoiding friendly gestures just to deny herself the comfort. She knows how intimate they can look between certain people. Farkle placing a hand on Smackle's shoulder looks different from Farkle placing a hand on her shoulder looks different from her dad placing a hand on her mom's shoulder. She can begin to guess where she and Lucas fall on that spectrum thanks to the chatter of her classmates, and she's had no interest to make things look more serious than they are.

Naturally, the first time she gives in and decides she needs the contact, it's at the worse time possible. Riley has to mentally scramble to decide the best way to politely squash Maya's assumptions and keep things on track.

"Yeah, having a _friend_ there when you need one is great." She mentally winces as the words come out. She wants the word friend to emphasize that's all she and Lucas are but it comes out so passive-aggressive. Like she's blaming Maya for not being there. Riley knows she can't do that. "I mean...my mom had just called to give me an update. And he was there while I processed it. It would have been just as nice with Farkle, or Zay, or Jenkins…" Or you.

The unspoken words echo loudly in Riley's head and seem to hang between them. How is she fumbling this so badly? She wants to fix this. She's been waiting for Maya to be ready to fix this, so that she can apologize and they can go back to normal. So why is she struggling now that she has the opportunity?

Maybe despite Lucas' assurances she really is broken. Before all of this Riley was a fixer. She was _the_ fixer. She fixed everyone else's problems and her own. But maybe now that she's so tired and not feeling things the same way, now that for whatever reason she can't seem to express herself she can't do what needs to be done to make the repairs.

Maybe broken people can't be fixers.

"How are the elder Matthews'?" Maya asks after several beats pass. She's still picking at her food, still seems vaguely distant and cold. Riley's not sure if she's mad about the implication that she hasn't been there for Riley or if she just doesn't believe that Riley and Lucas are only friends.

"It's still serious, but I guess the doctors are positive." Riley looks at her own lunch tray as she answers. The spaghetti and meat sauce looks entirely unappetizing and she's not sure how she'll manage even a few bites with the rock that's settled in her stomach. She settles on stabbing at her salad instead. "We'll know more tonight probably."

"Oh. Good."

More awkward silence. Suddenly there's a part of Riley that wants to shake Maya. She's the one that wanted to meet, why can't she be the one to start the conversation? Why is this, on top of everything else, falling on her shoulders? It's not like this estrangement is solely her fault so why should she be the one to-oh.

Maybe that's why her words aren't coming out right. Because she _is_ mad.

Riley hasn't wanted to admit it. She doesn't like being angry or what anger does to people. But somewhere in the back of her mind she's known that what Zay had told her yesterday is right: Maya hasn't been doing anything to make things better or to find a way to fix anything. Riley has been giving her space and making sure that she still has the support of her friends and pushing away Lucas and dealing with most everything entirely on her own to make sure that Maya didn't think anyone was choosing Riley over her and Maya….hasn't been doing anything like that.

How is that fair?

Riley knows how much she's been giving to make things work again and that most people in her position would be just as mad if not more so with Maya. But she hates herself for it. She can't be angry like this. She doesn't know how to be mad with someone and fix things with them at the same time, and fixing things with Maya has been her priority from the beginning. She can't be mad or ask herself why Maya wouldn't put any effort whatsoever into making things better or why she would spread the rumors she had (and Riley's not stupid enough to think that it wasn't Maya who told the school about the sweatshirt and everything else that happened in Texas even if she hasn't wanted to admit it) when she can guess what the answer would be.

Riley can't let herself think for even a second that maybe their friendship doesn't mean as much to Maya as it does to her or else the hurt would crush her. She'd never be able to move forward.

She just has to swallow it all back. She has to remember that it was her mistake that made all of this happen in the first place and hope that once she apologizes it will lead to Maya realizing that she hasn't been without blame.

If Riley ever wants things to go back to normal, she has to be the bigger person.

"About what happened in Texas…" Riley starts. "I was only trying to do what I thought would make you happy. I really thought that things would work out. But I should have talked to you before I-," It's as far as she gets. One minute she's talking, trying to ignore Maya's stoney-faced gaze, the next she's jumping to her feet as a mess of lukewarm spaghetti and meat sauce and chocolate milk spill over her head, drenching her.

The cafeteria erupts into laughs and sarcastic applause. To his credit, the clumsy seventh grader who had tripped over the hem of her pants and spilled her lunch on her seems suitably apologetic and embarrassed by the whole affair, but Riley can't bring herself to do anything to calm her.

Of course this is how her day goes. It's all she can do to bring herself to wipe the slop out of her eyes instead of trying to find a way to tunnel into the ground. Riley manages just in time to see Maya approaching, rolling her eyes.

"Come on." Maya grabs onto her elbow, carefully gripping around the mess and starts dragging her out of the cafeteria. "Do you have gym clothes in your locker?"

"In my bag, yeah. If you don't mind getting them out since my hands are a disaster."

"Yeah. Sure."

Maya drops her arm once they're out in the hall and heading towards their lockers. Riley tries to ignore how uncaring she's being (the Maya she knows would be concerned about if she was OK or if she was embarrassed or _something_ ) and goes back to trying to deliver her apology. At least if she fills the silence she doesn't have to keep thinking about everything that's going wrong.

"I should have talked to you before I did anything in Texas. I wouldn't have told Lucas about your feelings if I had known you didn't want me to, and it's my fault for not finding that out first. I'm really sorry that I didn't and that it made things so hard on you."

"But that's what you do, isn't it? You decide on something that needs to be fixed and you go for it, regardless of what anyone else wants. And...you wanted to fix me and Huckleberry." Maya starts to open Riley's locker.

Riley bristles. Is she supposed to be happy that Maya's ignoring her apology in favor of...acting like she should have just expected it? Because it doesn't feel good. It feels like there's a big part of her that Maya just tolerates because she has to and doesn't appreciate at all. And yes, it's a part of her that has caused problems, this time in particular, but she's working on finding a way to embrace that part of her in the right way. She had done it the right way when they threatened to take away the arts programs and she could do it the right way again.

She has to remind herself to breathe and stay calm before she speaks again. Losing her temper will fix nothing. "I did. But like I said, the way I did it was wrong. I shouldn't have done anything before I knew what you wanted. And you have every right to be upset with me for-,"

"Oh, you have got to be kidding me." Maya's disgusted groan cuts Riley off. She turns around, holding some bundled material in her hand. Riley can't even tell what it is until Maya is tossing it at her. "Seriously?!"

Lucas' sweatshirt hits her on the chest and Riley scrambles to catch it, even as her heart freezes. What was that even doing in her bag? She runs over everything in her mind, knowing that Maya is saying something else, but unable to process both at the same time. So much of the past few days has been a blur and Riley has to know how something she's been so careful about hiding and keeping private had gotten into her school bag.

She remembers putting it in her overnight bag when packing for the Minkus' and wearing it to bed the night before. And after she got dressed and dealt with Auggie she remembers getting her backpack ready for the day, and moving the sweatshirt out of the way while thinking about how comforting it is, and…Oh. How could she have been so stupid?

"Maya, Lucas and I are just friends. I swear. This isn't what it looks like."

"I don't even know what it looks like anymore." Maya shakes her head. "But I'm done talking about any of it. I'm done."

Riley can feel everything that's been building up, teetering above her head and threatening to crash down and crush her, start to waver as Maya speaks.

The bucket of ice water overturns and pours down her spine, seizing her lungs when Maya starts to walk away.

And the whole world seems to tunnel away and vanish when Riley notices Maya.

Taking off her ring.

By the time the world comes back into focus, Riley is on the floor. She doesn't even know how she got there, on her knees with the sweatshirt clutched in her hands, but she's there. It takes her another moment for her to realize that she's sobbing, gasping for air and coming up empty. She can't figure any of it out. What had just happened? Why can't she breathe? How is she suddenly crying? It doesn't make any sense.

Then Harper is crouching next to her, asking what happened, and Riley wants to answer but she can't make her voice work. She can't find the moments in between breaths—it barely feels like there is anything in her lungs—and she can't control her tears long enough to try and get anything more. She's not sure how long it goes on for. Harper tries to get her to calm down, tries to be soothing and get her to be breathe, and Riley only just manages to choke out her response.

"I—I," gasp, "I can't," gasp, "I-I can't stop," gasp.

She starts to hiccup as Harper tells someone to get the nurse. Her stomach churns and she can't stop crying, but she can't breathe and all she can see beyond the masses of Harper and who knows who else blurred by the tears is an endless cycle of horrible moments.

Finding out Mrs. Svorski was dead. Finding out Lucas didn't trust her with his past. The whole class thinking Maya and Lucas belonged together. The mess at the semi-formal. The texts. The texts. Those god-awful texts. _Stop being who you are or I'm gonna put my foot in your weird, stupid face._ The bell ringing so many times to get her to quit and standing alone in the face of everyone saying she couldn't do it. Realizing that Maya actually _liked_ Lucas. The hurt on Lucas' face when she called him her brother. Maya pushing her down to the bed and blaming her for everything. Agreeing to be friends and nothing more. The whispers and rumors at school, making her the villain of the whole mess. The never ending silence and the cold emptiness when all she wanted was a hand to hold or someone to hold her. Screwing her smile on in front of the mirror every morning. The news coming in and the look on her mother's face as she gave it. _There's been an accident. Your grandparents are in the hospital_. Auggie screaming and crying and her being unable to do anything to fix it. Maya taking off her ring.

It doesn't stop.

She can't stop.

* * *

We'll get to reactions from everyone else next time around. Thanks again for reading.


	7. Chapter 7

Notes: First off, thanks to everyone who's reading! Second, I just wanted to let you know that I have a busy couple of weeks coming up. I'm going to try and write as much as I can in my free time to get an update for you, but it most likely will be a while before another installment is ready. You have my apologies for that.

The two scenes in this chapter take place at approximately the same time.

* * *

At first Farkle can't believe the quickly circulating rumors. Nobody has any real details to speak of because all they saw was the aftermath, but everyone is saying that the much anticipated conversation between Riley and Maya had ended with Riley having some sort of breakdown. And Farkle just can't imagine that. Even with things so disjointed between them, he can't picture either girl taking things so far that the other was left shattered. They've been best friends for nearly ten years and a bond like that doesn't just go away.

Even less believable to him is that Riley is the one left broken. Not that he thinks Riley is capable of being coldhearted or mean-spirited enough to do or say anything that would leave Maya a wreck (he doesn't think Maya is either, but she's better at pretending that she could be) but given how little they've been talking and seeming to understand each other lately, Farkle can at least understand how something might be misinterpreted enough to bring the talks to a standstill and have someone storm off again. It even makes sense to him that that someone would be Maya.

But even for all of his worries about how Riley has been handling everything and how much she's hurting herself by not accepting anyone's help or talking about it, Farkle absolutely cannot fathom a scenario where she would actually break. Over the years he's seen her happy, sad, and everywhere in between and even at her most upset, Riley has always been strong. She doesn't crumble or dwell on things; she cries, yells, or whatever else she might need to do to let things out but then she moves on and finds a solution to the problem. He's always admired her for it and it doesn't seem like a trait that could just disappear. So he figures that maybe someone saw her crying and exaggerated the situation. After all, they're not very used to seeing anything _but_ smiling Riley.

Only the stories persist.

Lucas actually takes off without a word the moment he hears, leaving Farkle and Zay to check on Maya and get her side, he supposes.

Then the details grow. According to Jenkins and the cheer squad (who are often the most reliable sources for gossip if only because they make an effort not to spread the blatantly nasty stuff) nobody saw the actual event but afterward Miss Burgess found Riley incoherent and crying on the floor and couldn't get her to calm down or explain what had happened to put her in such a state. All anyone else seems to know is that she was still a mess from the clumsy seventh grader who dropped their lunch on her and that Maya is nowhere to be found, hence everyone assuming Riley's upset has something to do with their talk.

By the time the lunch period is over and Farkle gets to his study hall (and Lucas doesn't show up to join him) he's starting to think that there's some truth to the story, although he still doesn't believe it could really have been something between the girls that caused it. The Maya he knows has a tough exterior and at times might as well be a brick wall for how stubborn and unmoving she can be but she also cares deeply for people, particularly Riley, and doesn't just lash out with no reason. Not to mention, even when she does it's rarely with the sort of personal attack that would genuinely hurt someone who knows her as well as Riley does.

No, Farkle has to believe that, if anything, the girls conversation had been cut short by the lunchroom accident and Maya had gone to get Riley a shirt from the gym or something, leaving Riley alone. Then maybe Riley had gotten word that one of her grandparents had passed. He can imagine the death of a close relative being something that makes Riley breakdown much more than he can imagine Maya doing anything.

This scenario doesn't make him feel any better (how could it if Riley is really in that much pain) but it at least makes sense and to verify that he's on the right path Farkle pulls out his phone, positioning it carefully behind his books, and texts his mom.

 _Has there been any news about the Matthews?_

It takes her nearly a minute to respond.

 _No, not since this morning but I'm on my way to pick Riley up. School was a bit much for her it seems. Do you want to come home with us?_

Farkle knows that this is much more of a request than it is an offer. His mother, for all of her occasional petty fights with his dad and the odd comments people wrote in her high school yearbook, is very caring and attentive, but she is also the first to admit that she doesn't deal extraordinarily well with 'flagrant displays of emotion' (her words, not his). It's why she and his father get along so well to begin with; they both love passionately and strive to be the best but fail to understand the histrionics of others.

Her message tells Farkle that the rumors are very much true and that Riley has not only been upset by something, but upset by it enough that the school wants to send her home and his mom is worried that she won't be nurturing or helpful enough in the face of it.

Definitely not a good sign.

 _Sure. I'll be ready. Just let me know when you get here._

Farkle tucks his phone away again and requests a pass to the library. He's not going to go, but he needs the study supervisor to let him out of the room. If he's going to be leaving when his mom gets here and then trying to help Riley, he wants to know exactly what he's dealing with and he has a limited amount of time now to get that information. A couple of white lies will go a long way to making that happen.

He gets the pass without any trouble and heads out, stopping briefly at his locker to exchange the books in his bag for the ones he might need that night. Then Farkle swings by the nurse's office (where everyone leaving the school for non-disciplinary reasons waits) to get a better idea of what happened. The door to the office is closed, but as Farkle had suspected, a peek through the pane of glass in the door reveals Lucas is inside with his arm around a completely exhausted and wrecked looking shell of Riley.

They appear to be having a conversation with the third person in room, whose back is to the door but eventually turns enough that Farkle can recognize him as the superintendent who's friends with Mr. Matthews. Interesting.

Farkle doesn't knock to get invited in, but waves to get Lucas' attention (Riley seems a little too out of it to notice) and when Lucas looks up, Farkle gives his best look to inquire what exactly had happened. Lucas replies by wiggling the ring finger of the hand not holding onto Riley and mouthing a single sentence.

'Maya took off her ring.'

What?

Farkle is absolutely floored. The rings are sacred. They haven't been out of the girls sight since Riley had presented them to Maya. He's fairly certain that the only times they ever get taken off is in gym class (when they're secured very carefully in their lockers) and when they're sculpting in art class (when they get slipped around the chain of whatever necklaces the girls are wearing that day). They're the strongest symbol of the bond that Riley and Maya share. They're supposed to be permanent additions to their beings. For Maya to remove hers without an extenuating circumstance...Farkle can't imagine what must have been said or done to convince her that the bond was gone or not worth the work anymore.

He pulls his phone out again, this time composing a text for Maya.

 _We need to talk. Janitor's closet in five minutes._

Janitor Harley is very cool and understanding about the students sometimes needing a space during the day as long as they don't take advantage. Farkle is more than willing to use that to get to the bottom of this.

His phone buzzes in his hand.

 _Already there._

Farkle finds Maya there, sitting on the small desk. She's spinning her ring on the surface like a coin and when she looks up her cheeks are wet. Her eyes are the same and rimmed with red.

His initial shock and anger fades back. Of course Maya is hurt by this too. She never would have removed the ring if she wasn't feeling betrayed by _something,_ which is what's so maddening about the whole situation; he doesn't believe that either Maya or Riley has it in them to be truly mean-spirited and hateful towards the other, but maybe the stress of their current situation combined with some other outside event to make their hurt feelings and frustrations come out in some sort of ugly explosion.

Farkle doesn't understand how any of them let things get this far but he's determined to figure out what went wrong and how to fix it. Neither girl deserves to be as miserable as they seem to be.

"What happened?" He asks, sitting in the empty chair.

"You mean you don't already know?" Maya raises an eyebrow. There's a hardness and a sarcasm in her voice that Farkle hasn't heard directed towards him in years she's already on the defensive, yet another thing he can't begin to hope to explain.

"All I know is that you took off your ring and Riley's upset because of it."

Maya mutters a word or two under her breath that Farkle can't quite catch then speaks up, still bitter. "Shouldn't you be with her then?"

Farkle wants to help. And he'll listen, comfort, assure, and any other number of things to do that, but he won't put up with pity-party comments like that that are clearly trying to push him beyond her walls. He hardens his own tone a little. "Have I ever given you any indication that you mean less to me than Riley does?" He waits for her to acknowledge that no, of course he hasn't. "Then why would I start now? I know things haven't been good for you two since Texas, but you kept your ring on, which means you though it was fixable. So if you're taking it off now, something must have happened to make you think it's not."

It takes a moment for Maya to give him an answer. "I just realized that our friendship wasn't nearly as strong as I thought."

"What made you reach that conclusion?"

"Friends don't date guys that their friends like. Not without talking about it and getting permission."

Farkle has to fight to wrap his head around the fact that this is still about Maya thinking that Riley and Lucas are together, something that they have been (honestly) denying since day one. He can understand that if Maya has genuine feelings for Lucas, that getting turned down as she had been would cause a real hurt that wouldn't just go away overnight. He can even understand irrationally disliking the next person that a crush starts seeing. But he can't figure out why Maya can't see past those feelings to realize that Riley, someone who has never lied to her about anything important, is telling the truth when she asserts that she and Lucas decided to remain friends.

Not to mention the borderline hypocrisy of her anger. Maya has clearly figured out that the brother thing was a lie, but it sounds like she still want to be with Lucas if given the chance. Isn't that the same violation of the laws of friendship that she thinks Riley is perpetrating?

No, the facts of the situation seem undeniably clear to him, even if the feelings aren't. "Right. But Riley and Lucas aren't dating."

"She still has his sweatshirt in her bag. You don't just keep some guy's clothes for no reason."

This is normally true. But Farkle believes them when they say they're just friends, even if they do both want to be more, and there _are_ other explanations. "We know she borrowed it in Texas and it's been a crazy few weeks since. Maybe she only just got around to washing it and was going to give it back."

"You really think it took anyone in the Matthews house three weeks to do a load of laundry?"

"I think that Riley wouldn't lie to you." Farkle says. "And she's told you more than once that all she and Lucas are is friends." Maya doesn't respond and Farkle, knowing he can't have much more time before his mom arrives at the school, decides to use some of his remaining moments to present Maya with a few more of the facts she's been ignoring these past weeks. His mother had once told him that part of loving someone was letting them know when they were doing stupid things or making a big mistake (his father had added that often times the hardest but most important part of loving someone was doing this _gently_ ). "I also think that she feels horrible things didn't work out for you and that she's spent the last three weeks trying to make sure that you're OK."

"I told her to butt out."

"Well she cares too much to. She also cares too much to make the rest of us pick sides, or to not ask us how you're doing when she knows we've spent time with you or to make a big deal of the fact that you're the reason most of the school thinks that what happened in Texas is a lot more scandalous than it really was."

Maya glances down towards her lap. "I never meant for that to go all over the school."

"You didn't correct anyone either." He points out. "I know what happened hurt you. You have every right to be hurt. But you're letting your hurt cloud your judgment. You _know_ Riley. You _know_ she wants nothing but the best for you and you _know_ she would never do anything intentionally to hurt you."

He has more to say but an announcement comes over the PA, calling him to the main office. He stands.

"I want to see you happy Maya. Both of you. And I guess if you think that ending your friendship with Riley is what's going to do that for you then you have to do what you have to do. But you need to think long and hard about what it is you're giving up, and if it really is going to make you happy."

Farkle leaves before Maya can form a response.

* * *

"OK, the office is going to call your parents and get everything straightened out so you can go home for the rest of the day, and I'm going to stay here until then. Is that OK?"

Riley only manages to nod at her Uncle Jon's question. She's fairly confident that never before has she been such a horrible combination of exhausted and devastated. She's still not entirely sure what even happened out in the hallway. All she knows is that one minute, she couldn't breathe or control her crying at all and it felt like she might be dying, and the next thing she knew, her Uncle Jon was crouched down next to her, guiding her through some sort of breathing exercise. He calmed her down, didn't flinch when the nausea caught up with her and she dry heaved at his feet, and then brought her to the nurse's office

Now that things are quiet again, she feels like every last ounce of her energy is gone. Even nodding is a serious effort and she can't figure any of it out. She doesn't know why Uncle Jon is at the school today. She doesn't know why everything suddenly came out in that moment, when she'd been unable to let anything out for ages. She doesn't know why she couldn't control any of it, or why it had been so intense and terrifying.

She's never been so scared in all of her life.

Her Uncle Jon sits down in the office chair from the nurse's desk and slides it closer to the cot where Riley's been resting for nearly ten minutes. "How are you doing now, kid? Is your stomach settling down OK?"

Riley struggles for a moment to find the right words. It's so obvious to her now that no matter what anyone else says something in her is broken—why else would anything like this happen-and that's a problem. Now is not the time for her to be broken; there's too much going on with her grandparents, and she has to take care of Auggie, and she has to find a way to deal with the Ma-

She cuts her own thought off when her chest starts to get tight again. She can't deal with that. Just like she can't be broken. She just needs to find a way to convince everyone that this was a fluke. Even though she doesn't know what _this_ was.

"I'm really tired. And a little cold," because even though she had taken out her braid and run her fingers through her hair to get the bulk of the meat sauce out as a way to keep her hands busy while she finished calming down, she's still soaked with that seventh grader's lunch, "but I'm-," Riley nearly jumps when the door swings open with such force that it rebounds off the doorstop.

"What happened?" Lucas bursts into the room and for the briefest of moments Riley's back in her bedroom as he pile-drives through the wall of stuff she and Maya had barely finished putting up.

Uncle Jon's head snaps to the door and he stands. "Mr Friar..."

Lucas ignores him, walking towards her. "Everyone's saying you had some sort of a breakdown because of your talk with Maya. What happened?"

Everyone's saying that? Oh god…

It hits Riley that there were people in the hall other than her and Maya, so of course they had witnessed her epic meltdown and everything that followed. The nausea that had been ebbing away as time went on returns like a heavy stone as shame and humiliation enter the picture. Tears spring to her eyes at the very thought of what the talk must be like outside of the room now.

It's just not fair. Why can't even one part of this nightmare be private? How is she supposed to be strong when everyone else knows just how weak and broken she is?

Then Riley remembers that she is supposed to be convincing them that she's fine and having another freak out isn't going to do that. She calls on every ounce of energy she has left to stand and close the distance between her and Lucas, wrapping her arms around him; the best she'd felt in weeks was on the bench outside the history room in his arms and even if it's blurring the lines between them more than she should, she'll gladly borrow some of his strength right now and take a little comfort at the same time.

"Maya took off her ring and I overreacted a little." She says softly, swallowing thickly around the around the words. _It's not the end. It can't be the end. I can fix it._ "I'm OK though." Lucas' arms seem to squeeze a little tighter around her.

Uncle Jon closes the door and takes his seat again, seeming to understand that Lucas is going to be a part of the conversation. "Riley, you were having a panic attack."

Was that what that was? "No, I was just..." Riley stops talking. She doesn't have a good explanation other than what she already said. It seems smarter to stay silent than to say something that makes no sense and is an obvious lie.

"A panic attack?" Lucas guides her back to the cot.

"Maybe...I'm fine now though." She insists. They sit together.

"Do you think it had something to do with what you were telling me about after your mom called?" Lucas sounds so innocent and concerned when he asks the question, but all Riley can feel is the fragile strength she's been trying to build back up and project chipping away again.

She wants to shake her head and protest, to deflect attention away from that but finds herself unable to move or answer. There's a small part of her that's saying she needs to let the truth come out. She doesn't know a lot about panic attacks, but she's pretty sure it's not a good thing if you just randomly start having them and realizing that she probably did just have one is almost as scary as when she was in the middle of it.

Uncle Jon jumps into the conversation again before she can make a choice. "What were you telling him?"

"I was just...I..." The first time Riley tries and fails to answer it's an attempt to downplay the situation; then she thinks that maybe she just can't lie anymore so tries to tell the truth, but that won't come out either. She's just too tired and confused and unsure about what the right thing to do is anymore. She sighs, a long shaky exhale, and leans her head against Lucas. "I don't know how to explain it anymore."

Lucas launches into an explanation, and Riley just listens. He goes through everything, starting with their talk outside the history room, but then going back and explaining the bigger picture and the pressure she's been under with the Texas situation and Maya and everything else. Uncle Jon occasionally asks a question but for the most part it's just Lucas talking.

It's a strange thing, listening to it all like she's an outsider. Riley _knows_ how much she's been dealing with of course, but she's also spent a lot of time telling herself that most of it is fixable and not a big deal. That she could handle all of it on her own, no question.

Hearing it all from Lucas' mouth, where he doesn't downplay anything or mince words is almost shocking. It sounds so horrible and hard...It starts to hit her about halfway through that it's what she's been dealing with and she starts to cry again. Not the harsh, unyielding sobs from earlier but soft, exhausted weeping.

She doesn't know how to fix any of it.


	8. Chapter 8

Notes: In continuation with this being a canon divergent work, I have changed the original meeting between Riley and Maya.

* * *

Harley puts off returning to his "office", better known to most of the school as the janitor's closet, for as long as he can on this particular Thursday. He makes do with the supplies that he already has out in the school, raids the supply closet of the night janitor (who's a little weird and insists on keeping their equipment and supplies separate despite the fact that they use almost exactly the same things) and changes up the order of his normal cleaning routine to compensate for the things that he doesn't have with him, all to give the student hiding out in there a little extra time to figure things out.

For all that Harley resented the bulk of his fellow students in his middle and high school years and did his best to torment them and let them know that fact, he has a much deeper understanding of people and the world now and he tries his best to follow Cory and Mr. Feeny's example. Middle school is a complicated enough time for most kids what with the changing responsibilities and the influx of rushing hormones and who knows what else going on at home; the students don't need unfriendly or unsympathetic adults making things even harder. And while most of the kids aren't that interested in getting life advice from a guy who ended up as a janitor, they do all seem to appreciate that he's willing to give them a space that's not a bathroom to hide away and think things through for a little while.

Like the girl sitting in there now. Maya Hart.

Harley has known the girl for a couple of years. She's one of the more interesting students in the school in his opinion. Maya works hard to project a very specific image to the world: that she's tough and independent and above all of the feelings that are complicating things for everyone else. According to her, she knows exactly what she has and what she can get from the world, so she knows exactly where she's going to end up. It's the same attitude that he owned during his teenage years. But the image is only a small piece of the story.

Maya is also one of the handful of students that will always say hi to him and actually listen to what he has to say. She's got buckets of talent, she's surrounded by friends and teachers who believe that she's bound for great things and will do everything to motivate and encourage her to get there, and she goes out of her way to protect them from some of the harsher realities of the world and adolescence. While his rough edges and lack of motivation were his entire being when he was her age, hers have been rapidly softening and vanishing, held in place more as a mask than as an actual reality.

Harley's seen her a lot in his office these past few weeks, ever since she went on a trip to Texas with the rest of her little group. She hasn't been interested in talking about what had happened on the trip to make things fall apart between her and Riley, her best friend, but given that he's a janitor, that hasn't stopped him from figuring it all out. Students don't stop talking when he walks into the room like they do if a teacher shows up. Every story and every piece of gossip is available to him, without any trouble whatsoever. And he gets to hear everyone's version of events, so he normally stands a fairly good chance of piecing together what it is that's actually going on.

So Harley knows that at some point, Maya found herself with feelings for Lucas, one of the other upstanding students in the school. And this was a problem. Not because it's middle school and every time you get a crush on someone in middle school it's a problem, but because Lucas was the guy who had a mutual, undefined but ambiguously romantic relationship with Riley. Then somehow while they were in Texas, those feelings all came to a head, and things didn't go Maya's way. Things get a little less clear after that, because it also appears that things didn't go Riley and Lucas' way either and yet suddenly the closest friendship Harley has seen since Cory and his friend Shawn appears to have dissolved. Things have been very awkward, tense, and sad in the eighth grade as of late, and Maya's been riding a good portion of it out in his closet.

Harley's only tried to talk to her about it a couple of times. He knows kids don't always want to talk to people his age about their problems, and that she's got plenty of other people in her life that she can go to, so he hasn't thought much of her declining, but the longer the conflict goes on and shows no sign of being repaired, the more he considers ratting the girl out to one of the other teachers who she might be more inclined to open up to.

Then he learns the reason she's taken refuge on this particular Thursday.

Harley knows that Riley succumbed to all the pressure that she's been under (he had been the one to deal with the mess in the hall that had been left behind) and that the consensus with most of the students is that it happened after she and Maya were supposed to have a discussion, but it's much closer to the end of the day when he gets a detailed report that he can surmise to be fairly accurate. According to young Mr. Babineaux, who has gathered his intel from discussions with Lucas (who spoke with Riley) and texts from Farkle (who spoke with Maya) and is sharing it in hushed tones with some of the cheerleaders in the hallway between classes under the promise that they'll only use minimal details to stop everyone from using the event as grist for the gossip mill, Riley had been trying to offer an apology for the incident in Texas, when Maya had found something innocent that she deemed to be a betrayal; this resulted in Maya taking off some ring, which was apparently a very big deal and was enough to break through the walls Riley had built around herself.

After hearing the details of the story, Harley starts to understand the situation a bit more, particularly what it is that Maya might be going through and trying to hide from. With this newfound insight he decides that it's time that someone gets the girl to talk, or at least to listen, and with the other likely candidate out of town dealing with his family emergency, the duty essentially falls to him. Harley likes to think that he's matured enough to be able to handle it and handle it well.

So when he returns to his office a little before the bell rings to start the final class of the day and Maya is still there, sitting on his desk, he grabs his chair and spins it so he can sit on it backwards. "The word out in the halls is that you haven't had a very good day."

Not unsurprisingly, her walls are up in full force and she rolls her eyes. "What was your first clue, Sherlock?"

"I'm a highly observant and caring individual." Harley matches her tone. His experience as the hurting kid, angry at the world and everyone in it tells him he's more likely to get a response if she realizes he's not just another adult telling her to straighten up; attitude from him might make Maya get frustrated and close herself off further, but it just might make him more relatable. "I hear everyone's stories and today they're all about you. Word in the halls is that you and Little Matthews are ending your friendship."

"Yeah, you're really solving the mysteries now. Keep it up and Fred and Daphne might let you join the gang."

"I'm going to ignore your sarcasm because I know you're just trying to prove that the day hasn't beaten you."

"Keep telling yourself that."

"You know, you and me, we're not so different." Harley says after waiting a moment for Maya's obvious annoyance to dissipate a little. "I know what it's like. Having less than everyone else, missing parts of your family...I know it's not easy to grow up feeling like everyone else has these perfect little lives and you're so far behind you'll barely grow good enough to shine their shoes."

Maya scoffs. "I don't think that's a thing anymore.

Now Harley rolls his eyes. Trust a teenager to latch onto an outdated reference and miss the point entirely. "That wasn't what I was getting at."

"No, what you're getting at is that if I 'keep up the attitude like you did when you were my age I'll be wasting my full potential.'" She shifts into a mocking lecture tone and then slumps back out of it. "Thanks, but I've heard it before."

"Actually, I was going to tell you that you're lucky." Harley shrugs. "You've got something I never had when I was your age. But please, do continue putting words in my mouth. It sounds like you've got all the lectures down pat."

Maya blinks, staring at him and Harley mentally puts a tally mark on his side of the scoreboard; she's at least starting to hear him. Maya shakes her head, hard look sliding back into place. "Well, let's see...If you're going down the 'I'm actually really lucky' route, then next'll be, 'You're gonna wind up alone if you keep this up.'"

"That doesn't bother you?"

Maya pauses. Her breath hitches and she stares down at her hands, fiddling with something in her fingers. Harley just barely catches a glint of silver in the light before she shoves it into the pocket of her jeans. "Better to be alone where no one can hurt you than deal with this feelings crap."

And there it is. The reasoning that Harley is oh-so-familiar with. You have to hurt everyone else and push them away before they can do it to you. "Is that so?"

"Yep."

"Huh. And here I thought it was being alone that made me such a miserable jerk when I was in high school. I stand corrected."

"You weren't alone." Maya looks up, eyes just the tiniest bit wider. "Mr. Matthews told us a few stories. He said you always had those two guys with you." She taps her finger on her leg a couple of times, trying to draw on the names. "Freddie and the mouse!"

"Frankie." A smile pulls at the corner of his mouth at the mistake as he corrects her. "And Joey the Rat. And they were lackeys, not friends."

"There's a difference?"

"About the only thing a good friend has in common with a good lackey is that they're always around. But you can't talk to a lackey. Not about anything real. And they might take the fall for you, or intimidate someone so you don't have to, but every lackey has their limits; they're not gonna give you the kind of support that really helps you out, they just want things to stay the same. A lackey uses you just as much as you use them."

Maya takes a long moment to respond. "So you think things would have turned out different for you if you'd had real friends around?"

"I dunno." Harley shrugs. Honesty is important with these kids, even if it means revealing not-so-great truths about himself. "I was pretty messed up back then."

Maya scoffs and shoves herself off of the desk. She stands, arms crossed her chest. "Then why bother trying to convince me that I should keep them? You said yourself, we're not that different."

"I also said you have something I never had. A lot of somethings, actually. You've got a lot of people in your corner, Maya. A lot of people who give a damn and want to see you happy and succeeding. And I think you're smart enough to know that. So why are you trying to push them away? It can't only be because Lucas doesn't like you." Maya looks away, but doesn't say anything, so Harley keeps talking. He's on a roll now, and it feels like he's close to getting through to her. Maybe this is what Cory likes so much about teaching. "'Cause it may hurt now, but someday that heartache's gonna go away, and at the rate you're going, not a lot of people are gonna be around waiting for you when it happens."

"Has it occurred to you that that's what I want?"

"Nope. Because deep down, I think you know it's not."

* * *

"How do you do it?"

Charlie lets his head fall to the side, looking at the asker of the question. He's on his back underneath a row of desks, scraping gum off of the undersides in a detention he earned thanks to his repeated late arrivals in the mornings (having so many sisters and only one bathroom makes for a tight schedule in the mornings and it seems it doesn't matter how early he gets up, he still winds up getting pushed to the back of the line and therefore, leaves the house late) and even though the grunt-work started nearly half an hour ago now, his companion has been silent until this point. Not that he can blame her.

It's common knowledge around the school that Maya Hart has a lot to be thinking about.

When Charlie had first heard all of the rumors about Texas and everything that had happened there between that group of friends, he hadn't been surprised in the slightest. Everyone had been tracking Maya's obvious crush on Lucas for nearly six months, wondering what was going to happen and why Riley wasn't upset or doing anything about it when she and Lucas were actually close to being a thing.

The act of voting them best couple in the yearbook had been a poorly executed scheme by some of the girls to shake things up and make Riley take notice and fight for herself, only it hadn't worked. It was one of the reasons Charlie had gone for it and asked her to the semi-formal, even knowing that there was _something_ between her and Lucas; whatever the feelings were, it seemed possible that they weren't that strong if she wasn't mad at her best friend for flirting with him so blatantly that the school was willing to call _them_ the couple. But nothing had come from that night either, so Charlie took a step back, thinking that either everyone was misreading the situation, or the timing just wasn't right yet.

Then the group went to Texas, where it seemed everything came to a head. Plenty of rumors circulated, but the gist of them seemed to be that Riley brother-zoned Lucas and forced a conversation between him and Maya that hadn't gone well. Ever since, things in the group have been tense and downright frosty between the girls, with Maya suddenly spending a lot more time with the other artsy kids or on her own, and Riley still with Farkle, Zay, and Lucas but maintaining a certain distance between them.

Charlie had allowed his own wishful thinking that the brother thing was true and a nudge from Sarah convince him to ask Riley to the Spring Fling, but in reality the truth of what had happened should have been obvious to anyone who'd met Riley.

 _Something_ had happened to finally make Maya's feelings for Lucas clear to Riley, and instead of getting upset like anyone else probably would have, Riley had stepped back and removed herself from the equation to give Maya the chance to explore her feelings. Only for whatever reason, none of it had worked and now everyone is miserable, to the point where a lot of people are saying that the strongest friendship in the school might actually be over and done with.

So yeah, Maya has a lot on her mind and Charlie can't believe she's trying to talk about it with _him_ of all people.

"How do I do what?"

Maya has stopped her work scraping at the desks as well, but she doesn't look at him until well after she starts talking. "Well, you like Riley, right? Like, you liker her a lot and she's turned you down, but you still have feelings for her, don't you?"

Charlie hesitates for a moment, but eventually confirms that she's right. It's not like other people don't already know.

"So how do you spend time with her every day? How can you see her and just let go of the fact that she doesn't think you're good enough? How do you look at Lucas and not want to punch him in the face for getting something that you wanted so badly without even try-" Maya cuts herself off. From the look on her face as she turns away, Charlie can guess that she's just said much more than she meant to.

"You want to punch Riley in the face?" It's hard not to make the connection between Maya's words about him and what she's really thinking, and even harder to control his shock at the insinuation, but the glare Maya sends his way at the comment is enough to make him leave that alone for now and search out the broader point she's looking for help with: dealing with rejection from someone you're close to. Charlie still can't believe she's asking _him_ , but quickly realizes that the people she would normally go to just aren't options for this. "OK. So you want to know how I can still spend time with Riley even though I know she doesn't return my feelings?"

"Yeah."

"Well, it's not like the only thing I liked about her was her potential to be my girlfriend." Charlie says. "She's a great person that I want in my life, even if it's just as friends. It's a little hard right now, but it helps that she's always been understanding and polite about the situation. You know, neutral situations and conversation topics...really respectful and conscious of how things might affect me."

Maya closes her eyes, grimacing. "She really is Mary freakin' Poppins, isn't she?"

There's an odd mix of resentment and regret in her voice that Charlie can't figure out the reasoning of or how to deal with. He just moves on to the next thing he wants to say. "It also helps that I only have one class and lunch with her. A little distance, without staring and analyzing her every move and stalking her instagram," something he has a feeling Maya has been doing a lot of, "goes a long way."

"But..." She cringes again, this time letting her head fall to face entirely away from him. "Doesn't doing all of that hurt? You want her to be with you and she-,"

"I want her to be with whoever's going to make her happy." Charlie cuts her off. He's not sure if Maya is just confused about her situation or if she genuinely thinks _he_ feels the way she's describing, but he feels like he has to correct her either way. "It would be great if that was me, but it's not and I have to respect that. If I ever can't handle it, I'll take another step back until I can."

"But-"

"My feelings for Riley are nobody's problem but mine. I wouldn't like myself very much if I made them her problem or Lucas', because it's not their fault things didn't work. The situation just wasn't right. I would be a jerk if I didn't respect that."

A thick silence falls over them. Charlie can imagine that she's trying to apply what he's told her to her feelings for Lucas and maybe seeing if the approach could work for her. At least until she opens her mouth. "You know you talk like a girl about this, right?"

A small laugh huffs out. "I have a mother who's a therapist and five sisters, Hart. I can do talks about feelings _better_ than most of the girls in this school." This gets Maya to actually smile. She smothers it almost as quickly but considering how miserable she's looked lately, Charlie's going to count that as a win.

Things go quiet again and Maya sets back to work at scraping away the gum. Charlie follows suit. As he works, their conversation plays over in his head, one thing that Maya said in particular looping over and over. _How can you see her and just let go of the fact that she doesn't think you're good enough?_

He can't believe that Maya, a girl who he has never seen be anything less than bold, confident, and self-assured, actually thinks she's not good enough for someone. It strikes him as kind of awful if she really does; Charlie'll be the first to admit that her attitude can get a little old sometimes (even the biggest rebels in the school take a day off from the hating class routine once in a while) and that he doesn't totally understand the cheese souffle thing or why it hasn't gone away yet, but he knows she's a good person with a good heart. Riley wouldn't be friends with her otherwise. And nobody should ever feel like they're not good enough for another person.

Charlie stops chipping away at the gum once more. "Did Lucas tell you that you weren't good enough for him?" He doesn't think it's likely but he will rethink his position on punching Friar in the face if he's wrong. Even if it probably would result in him getting roughed up in return. Maya eventually denies the accusation. "Then why do think that's his reason?" This time she doesn't answer. "Maya, Lucas doesn't like you the way you like him. But as far as I know, he does like you as a friend and care about you. So whatever his reasons are for not wanting to date you, they have nothing to do with who _you_ are."

If she has a response, Charlie doesn't get to hear it. The detention supervisor comes in tells them that they're free to go, and Maya bolts.

* * *

" _And one for Yindra, and one for Dave, and one for Darby..."_

 _Riley grabs Farkle's hand as Missy approaches their lunch table, a stack of birthday party invitations in hand. It's technically against the rules at Benjamin Franklin Elementary to pass out invitations or gifts or anything else that might leave students feeling excluded, but everyone knows that if you do it in the cafeteria, the teachers don't notice or care. And if there's one thing Missy likes to do as the queen bee of the third grade, it's make people feel excluded. The weeks before her birthday in late September are the worst power trip of them all and this year appears to be no exception._

 _This year the rumor is that the party is going to be at the movies and Disney themed. Riley really wants to go. She loves Disney, and she's never been to a movie theater with only people she knows in it, but she's not sure if Missy will have an invitation for her this year. Missy is picky and a little bit flakey; you could be on her good side one day and the next she's telling everyone you called the teacher mom and told her you loved her during indoor recess, deeming you the ultimate baby._

" _And one for Farkle..." Missy lays a glittery envelope next to his tray. That's no surprise. Now that they're a bit older and everyone has realized that he's from_ that _Minkus family, they all want him at their birthday parties. Missy then passes over Riley to give invites to a few of the other kids sitting at the table, but stops in front of her once more, flipping through the remaining envelopes in her hand. "And that's it for this table. RSVP by next Friday!"_

 _Riley's heart falls below her stomach as she realizes that this year, she's one of the few who won't be going to the party. The only person at her lunch table in fact. Her cheeks are hot and red, and she's struggling to hold her head high and not cry when Farkle's hand slips out of hers and he gets up._

" _I think you forgot Riley."_

" _Oh, no I didn't." Missy shakes her head, smiling sweetly. "Riley's not invited."_

" _Why not?" Farkle asks._

 _Missy glances towards her friend that had been following her during the handing out of the invitations and hands her the remaining stack of envelopes. She turns back to Farkle. "Because. Riley is a goofy klutz who smiles too much and I don't want anyone that weird at my party."_

 _If Riley could make herself vanish and reappear in her bay window at home she would. Things always seemed better in the bay window._

" _You have no evidentiary support for your conclusions." Farkle puffs out his chest. He's only making more trouble for himself, but Riley doesn't know how to stop him; Farkle has always tried to protect her. "Riley's perfect."_

" _Perfectly dorky." Missy and her friend cackle. "And if you don't want to lose your invitation, I would stop defending her. Your family money only goes so far to cover up_ your _geekiness."_

" _Then it's a good thing the three of us don't want to go to your party anyways."A new voice chimes in. Riley recognizes the little blonde in torn jeans and a red flannel shirt as a new student this year, but she's not in her class so she has no idea of her name. But the girl plucks the party invitation out of Farkle's hand, and actually starts to tear it up, dropping the pieces at Missy's feet. "I've heard you can catch 'jerk' if you're not careful."_

 _Riley's eyes widen. Nobody just stands up to Missy. And certainly not to defend her and Farkle._

 _Missy's eyes narrow at the newcomer. "Who are you?"_

" _Maya Penelope Hart." The blonde grins. "I'm new here. And I like weird. So maybe think about that before you start insulting my friends again."_

 _Missy sputters a few times before spinning on her heels and huffing as she stalks away. Several of the students nearby who witnessed the confrontation quietly clap. The new girl, Maya, bounces through a bow before sliding onto the lunch table bench across from Riley._

" _That was fun. Is she always like that?"_

 _Riley still can't believe that any of it happened. "Kind of." She wipes her hand over her face to shake off the encounter with Missy then smiles, holding out her hand. "I'm Riley, and this is Farkle." She gestures towards her genius friend, who's slowly sitting back down next to her. "Why did you do that?"_

" _Like I said. I'm new here. I need a new best friend. And I'd much rather it be one of the weird kids than anyone like that. Plus she's a jerk." Maya grabs the apple off of Farkle's lunch tray and bites into it. "What kind of a name is Farkle?"_

 _Farkle rests his elbow on the table, his chin on his hand and sighs loudly. Riley can practically see the hearts forming in his eyes. "You're gorgeous."_

" _You can't handle me." Maya turns in her seat, blonde hair flying over her shoulder. She grins and quirks an eyebrow at Riley. "So what do you say? Best friends?"_

 _Riley can only imagine a world where she's friends with a girl like this. Maya is everything that she's not. Brave and cool and sassy...Riley's only ever been the girl that sits quietly and follows the rules. She's almost certain that the opportunity is temporary; at some point Maya will realize that she and Farkle just aren't cool and she'll look for friends that are more like her. But it could be a fun few weeks until that happens._

 _She nods, grinning so wide that it feels like her cheeks might split. "Best friends."_

Riley's eyes snap open and she gasps. She's not quite awake as she realizes her room is moving, and it takes her a few moments of rapidly glancing around to realize that she's not in her room, she's in the front seat of her Uncle Jon's car.

The talk with him and Lucas in the nurse's office had wrapped up with Uncle Jon insisting that she can no longer try and handle the various problems on her own, and since the school would already be talking to her parents about the incident in the hallway (Uncle Jon's still calling it a panic attack and Lucas latched onto that as well, but Riley is resolutely avoiding that term since she has no idea how to hide a panic attack or make it go away so it absolutely has to be something else) that would open the door for the whole conversation. Riley had tried to argue the point, but Lucas was on his side too and she had been too tired and upset to form a coherent argument.

Riley hadn't been present to hear the conversation, having been sent home with Farkle and his mom to clean up and get some rest, but the next thing she knows it's late afternoon and her parents have agreed that she and Auggie can miss school the next day and Uncle Jon is driving them down. She fell asleep only a few minutes after they got on the road, and then she had started dreaming.

"You OK over there, Riles?"

She jumps a little at Uncle Jon's question, unaware that he had even noticed her wake up. Riley forces herself to take a slow breath and nods, running a hand through her hair. "Yeah, I'm fine. Where are we?" She looks out the window, but there aren't any signs and in the twilight hours she can't get a good look at the area.

He meets her eyes when he glances briefly away from the road. "About halfway there."

On a perfect day it normally took a little over an hour and a half to get to Philly. Riley mentally calculates the approximate 45 minutes left in the drive and is more than a little surprised when the thought makes her heart pound; in just 45 minutes she'll have to see how her grandparents are doing and see the rest of her family. She'll have to tell them that she's a broken disaster of a person and that not only is she failing at handling any of her own problems, but now she's turning them into some sort of side show and that she's driven away her best friend, the girl they think of like a second daughter and-

"You sure you're OK?"

Uncle Jon's voice cuts through her train of thought and Riley's head snaps in his direction. She tries to muster up a smile to be more convincing but she can feel how fake it is and quickly looks away instead. "Yeah, just a little.." She trails off and glances in the rear-view mirror, spotting her brother. The perfect distraction. "Has Auggie been OK?"

"Auggie is watching some Lion King show that I didn't know existed." Uncle Jon answers. "And I haven't heard a peep out of him."

Auggie has a tablet borrowed from the Minkus' in hand and a large pair of headphones pushing down his curls. "The Lion Guard." Riley clarifies for Uncle Jon. "It's his favorite right now. He won't notice anything until we get there unless he has to go the bathroom."

"Good to know."

Riley turns to look out the window when Uncle Jon doesn't say anything else right away. There isn't much to look at, but she at least feels like she can think without her face giving everything away to him.

"I'm a little surprised you didn't sleep the whole way." He comments after a few moments.

"No, I suck at sleeping in cars. I always have weird dreams when I'm moving."

"Weird dreams, huh? Is that what woke you up?"

Riley had given the explanation without really thinking about it. Her mind flashes back to the dream. The day she and Maya had first met and decided to be friends. It's no mystery to Riley why she would be dreaming of that now, not on the day that Maya has decided that they're no longer friends. She's always remembered the day, but the details seem so vivid now. From Maya's swift treatment of Missy and her ability to put her firmly in her place to Riley's own prediction that the friendship would have an expiration date.

Really, it's a miracle it lasted six whole years.

It still hurts though. A giant, aching void, and Riley can't figure out a way to patch it or ignore it. Assuring herself that it was always going to happen doesn't work, nor does thinking about ways to fix the situation (not that she's come up with any way to convince Maya that things are worth fixing). From day one, she and Maya have shared everything with each other, and been as close as sisters. Her sister is walking out of her life and she can't do anything about it. How is she supposed to make that pain go away?

"Riley?"

She jumps again, jolting back into reality when Uncle Jon's hand falls onto her elbow. "Huh?"

"I said your name three times, kid." He says, drawing back his hand.

"Really?"

"You looked like you were gonna have another panic attack." There's those words again. "I thought I was going to have to pull over to help you."

Jeez, how much of a freaky burden can she be? No wonder Maya is bailing.

Riley feels the wave of shame and embarrassment spill over her. It seems like all she's done lately is make trouble for everyone else. Farkle and Zay have to watch what they say with her and Maya and split their time. All of her teachers have to take time to try and coach her back into being a good student. Lucas has practically become some sort of babysitter instead of a friend or potential boyfriend. And now Uncle Jon is taking time off of work to bring her to her parents (who are going to have to deal with her problems instead of helping with her grandparents) and it's not even a quiet trip because she's still freaking out over nothing.

"I'm sorry I'm being so much trouble." She apologizes, wiping at the tears that she hadn't even realized were falling again. Riley would have thought she was long out of tears, considering how puffy, red, and sore her eyes were (even after napping with one of Mrs. Minkus' cold compress masks) but somehow they keep coming. She sniffs a little. "I don't even know what's wrong with me."

"You don't need to apologize, Riley. You're not being any trouble. You've just been trying to deal with a lot these past few weeks on your own and it's finally catching up with you."

"Right. Because normal kids freak out in the middle of the hall because of one fight with their friend."

"From what Lucas was saying this is more than just a fight. And you didn't freak out. You had a panic attack." Uncle Jon corrects with an understanding tone when she scoffs. "You're not any less normal for having one."

Riley doesn't respond because she can't figure out if he really means it. He's practically family and it's family's job to tell you your pretty or normal or anything else even when it's not always true, but at the same time, she's fairly sure that he hasn't lied to her before about anything important.

"I mean, I'm pretty normal, aren't I?" He asks. Riley agrees quickly; they don't let weirdos run an entire school district. "What if I told you that I had a few panic attacks after my motorcycle accident? Does that make me less normal?"

Riley's automatic answer falls short from coming out. Things suddenly make a bit more sense. Why he's so insistent on calling the incident a panic attack, how he knew how to help her when no one else did, why he seems so understanding compared to almost everyone else (who just seems awkward). "You've...felt like that before?"

"Maybe not the exact same way you did," he hedges, "but I've felt like the world was being pulled out from under my feet and no matter how much I fought or scrambled I couldn't pull it back to me. I know how scary it is."

Oh.

"Riley, I don't know if this was just a one-time response to the situation for you, or something more, but you don't need to worry about being a burden or anything less than normal while we figure it out. Your parents and I want to be there for you if you'll let us. You're not doing any of this alone anymore."

Riley doesn't want to be doing any of it alone. She just wishes it felt easier to let anyone in.


	9. Chapter 9A-Philly

Notes: I have all the love in the world for each and every one of you. Thank you so much for your patience. Keep an eye out in a few more minutes for the second half of this update, Part 9B, which takes place at approximately the same time.

* * *

 **Thursday**

"Aug, bud, why don't you come sit with me and Aunt Morgan and tells us what you've been doing at school?"

Riley's cheeks heat up at her Uncle Eric's suggestion. She knows exactly why he's making it and it's not because he wants to hear about all of the latest developments with the classroom caterpillar. It's so he and Morgan can distract Auggie while her parents go with her and Uncle Jon to find someplace quiet to talk.

Their first priority upon arriving at the hospital twenty minutes ago had, of course, been getting a status update on her grandparents. It was all good news; her grandpa woke up briefly and the doctors were very pleased, and her grandma's surgery had gone well. The longer the conversation went on though, the more it drifted, and the more it became obvious that everyone there had been informed that _something_ was going on with her and it wasn't anything good. A lot of glances got thrown around between Morgan and Eric and her parents (Josh is in the room sitting with her grandpa or Riley's sure that he would have joined in as well) and there was more than one elbow nudge followed by a significant eyebrow raise.

Auggie either doesn't realize the ruse or doesn't care, because he's quick to join Eric and Morgan and start telling them all about Ava sharing her cupcake with him today.

Riley's parents lead them from the family waiting area to a smaller alcove a few hallways away. As they sit, Riley ends up sandwiched between her parents which is a bit of a relief (if she's across from them and they're staring waiting for her to say something it's almost like giving a presentation to the class where she has no clue about any of the material, but with them next to her it's more like being in the bay window which is at least a comfortable space) until her mom speaks.

"OK. So I think it's obvious that we have a lot to talk about, but let's start with the most important thing. When Jon called us earlier from the school, he said you had a panic attack. How are you feeling now?"

As first questions go, it could be worse. Riley still takes a moment to think about her answer, because it has to be worded just right. She's starting to come on board with the idea that it's important to be open with her parents about her ongoing troubles because they might be able to give some advice or at least support her in ways that she's not getting right now, but she also doesn't want them to start worrying about her or thinking that they need to hold her hand all the time to guide her through everything since she makes such bad decisions sometimes.

"Uh...OK, I guess. I'm pretty tired, but I was really tired before it happened too." She reaches up to brush some hair behind her ear. "Which is probably why one thing happening just made it seem like everything else was coming back around. I just couldn't make sense of any of it or stop it for two seconds to breathe until Uncle Jon showed up and talked me through it. But I mostly just feel silly now."

"What one thing happened?"

"Everything else?"

Her dad's question comes barely a moment before her mom's, so Riley answers him. "Maya took off her ring."

"She what?!"

Her mom gently smacks the back of her hand against her dad's chest and urges her to continue. After that, it gets a little bit easier to explain. Riley summarizes the day's fight (and picks at her fingernails in her lap to have something other than what happened to focus on) and after a little prompting from Uncle Jon she moves on to telling them about everything that she's been keeping to herself since Texas. As she finishes, her mom reaches over and grabs one of her hands. "Why didn't you talk to us about any of this before?"

Her mom's voice is thick and wet and Riley's control starts to shatter. "Do you have any idea how hard it is tell you about the stupid mistakes I make? When all you ever are is this fierce genius in control of everything and changing the world and I'm just this silly little girl that can barely keep her own life together sometimes? I feel stupid enough about all of this without knowing for sure I've let you down."

"You could never let us-,"

"And I never know if I go to you if I'm talking to my teacher or my dad." Riley interrupts, turning to look at her dad. "I know you've said school is school and home is home, but it doesn't always work that way."

"Riley, you're my daughter first." Her dad leans forward, placing a hand on top of hers and her mother's. "Whether we're in our apartment, or school, or anywhere else, you're my daughter. If you come to me with a problem I'm going to do anything I can to fix it. Or at least to give you the tools you need to fix it. All you ever have to do is tell me."

Riley's not sure how she's supposed to feel better, hearing any of this. Theoretically she knows she should be thrilled to hear how supportive her parents are, even after she's messed things up so much and actually made their lives more complicated; she's incredibly lucky to have parents who care so much and want to help but all she can feel is this incredible pit of guilt sinking down into her stomach.

Her mom is practically crying because of her. Her dad looks even more crushed. They're both just sitting there, holding her hand and looking at her, waiting for her to say something else with their sad eyes and all Riley can think is that _she made them feel this_. If she had just figured out how to fix everything, or gotten over herself and talked to them at the start then maybe they wouldn't look so unrecognizable now.

She's made her parents practically unrecognizable. The shame is enough to wash over almost everything else.

"I don't even think I know what I need most of the time."

"That's one of the good things about asking the right people for help." Uncle Jon says. "They can help you figure that out."

Her mom nods, pulling her hand away briefly to thumb at the tears near her eyes. "Exactly. Right now, if we're looking at things objectively, there are two problems we need to deal with. The Maya situation, and figuring out some better, healthier ways for you to deal with your stress. We can't do much about either of them while we're out of town, but we can definitely talk about what options you have. And if you think something sounds great, tell us and we'll try to make that happen, OK?"

It's all such a vague concept. Talking about options for fixing everything. Riley can't even begin to imagine what any of that might entail, but it seems to be giving her parents something new to focus on and taking away some of their distress, and all she can do is nod. "OK."

* * *

 **Friday**

It's not even six-thirty when Riley gives up on sleeping in the next morning. She's slept fitfully, plagued by more dreams of Riley and Maya: The Early Years that keep changing into that awful moment in the hallway and other times when things have been less than good between them. The mix of nostalgia and heartbreak leaves her feeling nauseous. She's sick of tossing and turning and worried that she's going to wake her Aunt Morgan up (everyone is sharing with _someone_ to avoid dealing with hotels) so she goes downstairs to the kitchen and brews herself a mug of tea in the single serve coffee machine.

If she can't sleep, she can at least get some serious thinking done.

With tea in hand to settle her stomach, Riley creeps outside to the backyard still in her pajamas, and sits on the bench. The sun is crawling up, casting everything in a pinkish glow. There's a beautiful picture somewhere in it, maybe in Mr. Feeny's garden or over the roof of the tree house, but even with the few lessons that Uncle Shawn has given her with her camera she doubts she could capture it. Maya could though.

Maya.

Riley sighs and bows her head. All of the questions and problems swirling around her head center around Maya. Why did Maya have to fall for Lucas? Why won't Maya believe her or accept her apology? Why did Maya take off her ring? Is this as painful for Maya as it is for her? How is she supposed to fix any of this? Is it even worth fixing? Does Maya even want things to be fixed?

And then, Riley thinks, does she even want things to be fixed?

Everyone else seems to think that repairing the friendship is inevitable. Talking with her parents at the hospital that had been one of their main staying points; _'It all seems huge and impossible now because the hurt is fresh and you're overwhelmed. Use this weekend to take a step back and relax and when we go back to the city on Monday we'll figure out a way to get you girls talking again. It's just a few small mistakes and it will all blow over.'_

Farkle sends a text telling her to get some rest and not worry about a thing. He's been talking to Maya and he promises to find a solution for everything.

Zay wishes her well and tells her they're working on a plan.

Lucas is the only one who doesn't mention Maya at all, just checks on her and lets her know that if she needs anything, she can call him. His message was the only one she could even come up with a reply for. She doesn't know how to explain her doubts about fixing things with Maya, or how the very thought of even just seeing her again sets her heart pounding. Even with her parents Riley just nods and lets them keep talking because they seem so intent on it.

Her decisions haven't been that good lately so maybe she should just let everyone else take charge. Maybe everything will work out better that way.

Riley's thinking about it all so intently that she doesn't even notice anyone approaching until Josh is sitting next to her on the bench.

"Is that coffee?" He mumbles, rubbing at his face. "Tell me that's coffee. I cannot be awake this early without some caffeine, like, now."

Some of the heaviness lifts off of Riley's chest and she smiles. "Just tea."

Josh reaches over and grabs the mug anyways, taking a huge gulp, and then grimacing. "Jeez, that's terrible. Don't you put sugar or honey or anything in it?"

"It's fine plain." Riley giggles and takes the mug back. "I didn't wake you up did I?" As part of maximizing the space in the Matthews house for all of the visitors, and to make things a bit more fun for Auggie, Josh had taken a couple sleeping bags and spent the night in the tree house with her brother.

"No, that was Auggie's snoring. For a tiny kid he makes noise like a foghorn."

"I always thought he sounded more like a chainsaw."

"Either way, the kid is _loud_." Josh sighs and leans over and nudges Riley gently with his elbow. "So that's my excuse, what's yours?"

"What's my what?"

"Your excuse for being up at this ungodly hour when you don't have to be."

Right. That. Riley takes the last sip of her tea to buy herself some time before answering. She has to debate herself whether or not she should tell the truth and get sucked into another conversation about the whole mess or just make something up and hopefully move on. As she bends down to put her empty mug on the ground she lands on telling the truth; Josh normally gives good advice and maybe he'll actually realize that she's not sure about what she really wants to do. "I can't stop thinking about this thing with Maya."

Josh, of course, has heard most of the story by now. "Every good friendship has a fight like this at some point, Riley. Nobody gets along all the time. You can't stress about it."

That's it? That's his big advice? Don't stress about it? Well, gee, if only she had thought of that before. "It's just that...this is bigger than some silly fight, Josh. She won't talk or listen to me."

"She's just hurt. She shows it differently than you but that's all it is. Cory and Topanga are gonna do something to help you guys talk it out and that'll be the end of it. Your friendship with Maya is way too strong for anything as ridiculous as a guy to come between you two."

Riley has so many protests. Her feelings for Lucas are not ridiculous or silly or trivial and judging from Maya's reaction to his rejection, neither are hers. The fight isn't just about Lucas at this point, there's trust and jealousy and a lot of other things involved. Their friendship hasn't felt that strong in a long time, not since the yearbook came out. And she still doesn't know if she wants to talk it out.

She doesn't know how to explain any of that. Everyone seems to think they understand it all and Riley can't really make the words make sense in her own head, let alone find a way to make them clear to anyone else.

Besides which, it's obvious that they all _want_ things to be fixed and go back to normal. They love her, but they also love Maya. And if the two don't work things out, then every change that's been made lately will become permanent. Clearly, nobody wants that and they're focused on preventing it, regardless of everything else that's going on.

Is Riley supposed to stand in the way of that?

She presses her lips together in a tighter smile. "I know."

"It's all gonna work out, Riles. You two will be reading each other's minds and making Cory and Shawn jealous again in no time." Josh pats her on the shoulder a second time. "I'm gonna go crash on the couch for a while until the sun is a little closer to it's normal home in the middle of the sky."

Riley bites her lip as Josh stumbles back into the house. She knows that part of the reason their talk was so bad just now is that her uncle was really still half asleep; he's never been a morning person and doesn't function well until around 10:30 or after two or three cups of coffee, which ever happens first. And she knows he's also distracted by his parents being in the hospital even though they're out of the woods now but it still stings that, like everyone else, he can't see past the Maya issue to talk about the other parts of the problem or to notice that she's not entirely sure about fixing things with Maya. Yes, she didn't speak up, but he's always known her better than just about everyone except for Maya, so that he hasn't noticed her reluctance at all…

She never should have let Maya teach her how to lie and hide things. She's obviously gotten too good at it.

"Good morning Ms. Matthews." She just barely stops herself from jumping when Mr. Feeny greets her from next door. He's dressed for the day, with a trowel and a pair of garden gloves in the oversized pockets of his jacket, and he's carrying a thermos. "Are you normally this early of a riser or are you heading in to the hospital early to see your grandparents?"

"Neither." Riley shakes her head. "I've just been having some trouble sleeping. I thought I'd drink some tea and watch the sunrise."

"A pleasant alternative." Mr. Feeny nods. He places his thermos on a windowsill and starts to slip on his gardening gloves so he can start working on the window boxes. "Is there something in particular troubling you?"

Riley stands, walking the short distance to the fence between the neighboring yards. If she takes her parents' and everyone else's word for it, there's nobody better at advice than Mr. Feeny. It seems impossible to talk to her parents or family or friends about her growing doubts about Maya, knowing that they love her friend at least as much as they love her, but she's only met Mr. Feeny a handful of times, and is fairly confident that he doesn't share the same attachment to Maya; it's possible that he'll be objective. "How are you supposed to fix things with someone when just the thought of being in the same room as them makes it hard to breathe?"

Mr. Feeny takes a brief moment before he answers. "I assume this has to do with the conflict your having with your friend, Ms. Hart."

"You talked to my parents, didn't you?"

"Your father stopped by last night, yes." He confirms. "He's very concerned about you. He seems to think you're making yourself sick over an argument that's gotten out of hand."

"Making myself..." Riley drops off, all of her nausea that had been pushed back by her tea swelling up again. Is that what they thought? "I'm not _making_ myself sick."

Mr. Feeny raises a gloved hand to hand stop her rant. "I believe he merely meant to imply that your emotional distress over the problem was manifesting itself as physical symptoms."

"I just don't know what I'm supposed to do about all of this." Riley explains the whole scenario in more detail than she has with anyone else. It _is_ easier to tell Mr. Feeny, who has no actual horse in the race so to speak, what she's actually thinking about what's happened. His words come off so clinical and objective, but his voice is still so gentle and caring; it's no wonder her parents went to him with all of their problems in school. "Maya's been my best friend since the third grade and I don't want to lose her but...I'm not the only one who made a mistake here. She's really hurt me, more than once, and it feels like nobody cares about that, they just want us to be friends again." She says, after telling him the details of the fight. "And maybe I want us to be friends again too. I don't know.

"I just...I've spent six years being her friend, trying to do everything I can to be there for her when she needs someone and doing my best to make sure she's happy, and I get that I shouldn't have put her in the position I did and that she doesn't have to accept my apology but she won't even listen to me or believe me about anything else...How is that fair? How is it fair that I put in so much work to be a good friend and I sacrifice things for her, but she gets to throw tantrums and spread rumors and act like her entire world is awful because of me? Why should I go back and act like nothing she's done bothers me when she doesn't care enough to even pretend that it's hard for her to throw away our friendship?"

Mr. Feeny, who has crossed over to meet her at the fence during her lengthy explanation and removed his gardening gloves once more, taps them against the top of the gate. "You shouldn't."

Riley is so stunned that he understands and potentially agrees with her that she can't come up with a response.

"Ms. Matthews, any relationship, whether it be platonic, familial, romantic, is meant to be a two way street. No single person should have to do all the work. Both parties need to be able to trust and communicate with each other, to find common ground and understanding. If only one person tries, then only one person gets the benefits and it's not the person who deserves them. So if you truly believe that Ms. Hart is not holding up her end of the deal, so to speak, you have no obligation to continue to try and hold up yours."

"Everyone else seems to disagree with you."

"I don't think you told everyone else as much as you just told me. Perhaps they don't understand entirely where you're coming from. But even so...this isn't about their relationship with Ms. Hart. It's about yours. Your opinion and decision is the only one that matters. Don't let anyone else convince you of anything different."

* * *

 **Saturday**

" _Truth or dare."_

" _Come on Riley." Maya groans as she reenters Riley's bedroom after changing into her pajamas. It's the night before they start middle school and Maya's mom is working a double shift at the diner so Maya is sleeping over. "This game is stupid enough when you have a whole group of people. Don't make me suffer through another five rounds of you daring me to speak in a British accent for ten minutes."_

" _I'm just trying to have a little fun before tomorrow." Riley loves sleepovers and the games that you can play at them. Why shouldn't she distract herself from her nerves over starting at a new, bigger school with her_ father _as one of her teachers by enjoying one of them with her best friend? Especially when it might be one of the last times she and Maya hang out like this. "You don't have to pick dare if you don't like the ones I come up with."_

 _Maya tosses her bunched up clothes onto the floor near her duffel bag. "And throw myself at the mercy of your truth questions?" She shakes her head. "I don't think so."_

 _Riley resists the urge to bite her lip. She can't force Maya to play the game, no matter how much she wants to. No matter how curious or worried she is. "Fine." A moment later inspiration strikes. She can't force Maya to play, but maybe she can entice her. "What if I let you pick out what I wear tomorrow?"_

" _Riles, you've had your first day of sixth grade dress picked out for three weeks. You'd really let me change that up?"_

 _The cringeworthy combinations that Maya might put together make her hesitate, but Riley beams and nods anyways. "For anything in my closet."_

 _Maya goes over to the closet, throwing open the doors. "Truth it is. Do your worst." She starts pawing through Riley's clothes. Some of the hangers she pulls get tossed to the ground, some of them go towards the bed where Riley's sitting._

" _Do you think we're going to stay friends?" Riley debates with herself before she asks the question, but she might only get once chance and she has to know. She still remembers the first time she met Maya, thinking that the blonde was only going to a temporary blip in her and Farkle's lives. A fun and amazing blip, but a blip just the same that would move on when she found greener pastures. Riley can't believe that it's been three years and they're still so close—not once has Maya ever even indicated that she might want to move on. But she can't shake the feeling that the day will come._

 _Everything that Riley has heard about middle school, from TV to her Uncle Josh to the older kids who hang out at Svorski's tells her that it's the time when people really start figuring out who they are and finding out what they're into and what cliques they might belong in. And if she knows anything, it's that she and Maya are not the same type of person._

 _Maya is brash and confident and ignores all the rules. She doesn't care what anyone thinks and she's so strong, standing tall despite all the hardships she's dealt with in her life. Maya is pretty much the coolest person that Riley knows._

 _Meanwhile, Riley's a happy-go-lucky, klutzy, goody two-shoes. She smiles at everything, and desperately wants to fit in, even though she cares too much about what her parents and teachers think to ever make that happen._

 _Maya might have been able to ignore all of that in the small little pond of Benjamin Franklin Elementary School, but Riley can't imagine the same will be true in the massive ocean that is John Quincy Adams Middle School. At some point she's going to meet the other cool kids, and realize that it's not just that Riley and Farkle are a little weird, it's that they're total dorks, and that she'd be having a lot more fun and go a lot further in her life if she stopped spending time with them and moved on._

" _What a waste of your truth. Of course we're gonna stay friends." Maya's still facing the closet but Riley knows her friend is rolling her eyes. "Why would you even ask me that?"_

" _Because..." Riley starts to fumble through the pile of clothes Maya has sent her way, and she quietly relates her worries to her friend. Maya spins on her heels when Riley mentions that they're nothing alike, and crosses the room to sit in front of her on the bed when Riley says she'll realize her world could be more fun without Riley in it._

 _Maya grabs Riley's hand. "Riley Matthews, that is, without a doubt, the stupidest thing I've ever heard. You're my best friend. My world is nothing without you in it."_

" _But-,"_

" _Do you remember the day we met? And I said I'd rather my best friend be one of the weird kids?" Maya waits for Riley to nod before she continues. "Do you know why?"_

" _No."_

" _Because weird kids like you and Farkle don't care that all my clothes come from a thrift shop, or that I can't afford to throw big parties or go to the movies all the time or anything else. All you guys care about is being good friends. And that's way more important to me than hanging out with any of the supposed cool kids. Riley, you've been the best thing about my life since the day we met. You're my best friend. There's not a person in the world that could walk through the door of John Quincy Adams that could ever change that."_

Riley's elbow hits the floor first and it's only the jolt of sharp agony that makes her brace herself enough that her face doesn't crash into the carpet as well. "Ooof!" She kicks her legs, feeling all too restricted by the sheets and comforter wrapped around her feet. Maya's last words in her dream echo loudly in her head; it takes every last bit of Riley's focus to push them into the background once more.

She manages three choked breaths before she's steady enough to sit up. With her elbow still throbbing, Riley looks to her Aunt Morgan's bed, fearful that she's woken her up with her commotion, but finds it empty and half made instead. A glance to the alarm clock on the bedside table is surprising.

7:30.

It's later than she's managed in weeks. Riley would almost feel rested if it weren't for the fleeing adrenaline and the lingering wistful agony from her dream.

She'd left her talk with Mr. Feeny a bit more at peace with the mess in front of her. She still had a million things to think about and still wasn't sure if she could make a choice that people might not agree with (or if that was even the choice that she wanted to make) but there was something soothing about just knowing that there was someone who actually understood why she had to think about it in the first place. Riley had been able to split her day between time at the hospital waiting for more news and helping to keep Auggie occupied and working on some of the classwork she was missing and needed to make up and feel like she was actually taking some of it in. She'd been so focused that she'd gotten away with having only two more uncomfortable and emotional conversations with her parents about what was going to happen next and how they could make things easier for her, and even though those talks had given her a bit more to consider, they weren't enough to totally disturb her newfound calm, and sleep had come relatively easily and stayed until the dream hit her.

Just as quickly it all vanishes. The abstract concept of maybe letting her friendship go with Maya is one thing but the bigger slam back into reality of what exactly she'd be letting go is another. It's so easy when she's hurt to only remember what she's done—the times that she's shared her things and family with Maya and all the times that she's schemed to make sure her friend gets the support and recognition that she deserves—but despite the way things have felt lately, it's never been a one-sided relationship.

Maya has always been the first person to stand up to anyone who dares make fun of Riley. She's been dealing with Riley's insecurities for years and still reassures her no matter how old it must be getting. When it all comes down to it, Maya has probably done just as much scheming to try and make sure that Riley ends up happy as Riley has done for her.

What's more important? Can she really forget the past month in favor of the last six years? Can she forgive Maya for dismissing six years of friendship? For doing and saying the sorts of things that they'd always promised they would never do or say to each other?

How can she make that decision?

There's too much spinning around her head for her to focus on any one thing. She has to get it out. Riley scrambles to her feet and grabs her phone from the bedside table. She sits on the edge of the bed, pulling up the contact from her address book and initiating the call from pure muscle memory. She gets an answer from a sleep-clogged voice on the very last ring.

"Hello?"

"Can we talk?"


	10. Chapter 9B-New York

Notes: This takes place at approximately the same time as what happens in 9A. The differences should be clear.

* * *

 **Thursday**

"Woah, Lucas. Ease up on the beat down. Show 'em a little mercy."

Farkle pauses the game and both he and Lucas stop their frantic mashing of buttons on their controllers to turn and stare at Zay. "Did you just come down on the side of the zombies in _Zombies Eat Your Brains 4_?" Farkle asks.

The look that Zay sends them in return is just as pointed. "They may be mindless zombies with the intent of killing you and eating your brains but that doesn't mean they're not human."

"That is exactly what that means!" Lucas' reply is a little louder and more heated than it needs to be.

In response Zay crosses his arms over his chest and shakes his head. "All I know is you have a gun and ammo in your inventory so you could humane about it but instead you're bludgeoning them with your spiky baseball bat thing and you're hitting them way after they're down. It's overkill and I don't like it."

Lucas sighs. OK, so _technically_ he's going overboard with the zombie killing, but it's a good way to deal with some of his frustration and anger. Not to mention it's really satisfying to be given a problem and not only know the solution to it but to actually be able to put the solution into action. Problem? There's too many zombies that want to eat his brains. Solution? Kill the zombies. It's simple and straightforward in a way that the real world just hasn't been lately.

What had started as some hurt feelings and a couple of days for everyone to cool off has turned into something much bigger than anything Lucas could have imagined and the conclusion they're rapidly barreling towards is one that nobody actually wants to see happen. Riley and Maya no longer being friends. He's felt helpless and responsible for the past month.

Two people that he cares deeply for, albeit in very different ways, have been hurting and miserable at least partly because of their feelings for him. Lucas doesn't think it's possible that what happened in Texas and the subsequent explosion happened solely because Maya had feelings for him that he didn't return (and some of his talks with Mr. Matthews seemed to imply the same thing) but it's obvious that he played a role in some way and that kills him. He would never want to be the cause of someone's unhappiness, and it had been bad enough having to let Maya down at the campfire but then things got worse between the girls. Every subsequent fight, detail, and hardship has been another weight laid down across his shoulders.

It feels like he should be the one to fix things since he's part of the reason they're broken, but Lucas has no idea how.

Maya won't talk to him at all, which he understands but doesn't much like, and until the last day or so Riley would barely let him sit next to her let alone let him or anyone else be there for her. And now Maya has done the unthinkable, removing her ring and completely pulling the rug out from under Riley. He can't say how much of Riley's breakdown earlier was because of Maya and how much was other pressures, but as with his burden of responsibility for the initial conflict, it seems clear that Maya has to shoulder some of the blame here. He's not even sure what the two would need in order to even get back on the path towards fixing things, let alone actually repairing the damage that's been done.

It's part of why they're at Farkle's playing video games. The genius is at a similar loss as to what can be done, but even more unwilling to admit that this might be the end of Riley and Maya's friendship. He had invited them over for dinner after Riley, Auggie, and Mr. Turner had left for Philadelphia. When no ideas had come to them during the meal, Farkle had insisted they play _Zombies Eat Your Brains 4_ because mindlessly killing zombies was where he did some of his best thinking.

Lucas has, admittedly, been much more focused on the zombie killing than the brainstorming, but hopefully it's worked for Zay and Farkle. "I don't suppose either of you have come up with any bright ideas to fix all this."

"Well, if we've learned anything about conflict this year, it's that you should always try to talk things out." Farkle begins. He puts down his video game controller. "Only they've gone three weeks without saying a word to each other and if today's any indication I'm not sure that Maya's very interested in long conversation anyways." He tilts his head towards Zay. "Has anything like this ever happened on _High School Love Dodecahedron?"_

Lucas nearly groans.

"The dramatic end of friendship thing or the best friends not talking thing?" Zay asks. "Because yes. To both. All the time."

"How do they normally fix it?"

Lucas can't believe what he's hearing. Seriously?

Zay considers things for a moment before providing an answer. "It usually goes one of three ways. Sometimes the two that are fighting get caught up in some life threatening peril that they have to band together to get out of and realize in the process how much they'd be throwing away,"

"So that one's out." Farkle says.

Zay continues. "Sometimes they take a break away from each other, some other big thing happens to one of them to make them realize that whatever happened between them wasn't all that bad and then thy get partnered together for an English project or whatever and just start being friends again."

"Possible, but it seems like a long wait unless we could find a way to speed it up."

"Or, and this one is definitely the one that happens the most, they get locked in a room together through detention, accident, or scheming by other friends and they stay stuck until they've hashed everything out, at which point there's usually only five or so minutes left in the show so a janitor miraculously shows up with some keys or whatever."

Farkle snaps his fingers and points at Zay. "That's the one."

This time Lucas can't hold back his groan. "You've got to be kidding me. You're not seriously suggesting we use plots from a teen soap opera as solutions to actual _real world_ problems are you?"

"Well, _I_ don't have any better ideas." Zay shrugs. "And I don't hear you coming up with any."

"It's not that irrational. Everything happened exactly the way Zay said it happened on the show. Things were awkward, nothing resolved on it's own..."

Lucas genuinely can't believe he's hearing this. And from Farkle of all people. He, who comes out of a movie with an itemized list of everything that the film got wrong, is actually suggesting that they do things the Hollywood way. "Just because they get a couple of things right doesn't mean they're suddenly geniuses. You're talking about the same show that has characters transferring in and out of classes based on their relevance to the plot that week."

"I'm not saying we just take the plot and make it happen without any thought or tweaking." Farkle clarifies. "But we have to do something. If it were you and me, or you and Zay, Riley would be doing everything she could to fix it."

"And she probably wouldn't have waited three weeks like we did." Zay leans back in his chair when both Lucas and Farkle send mild glares his way. "What? Not helping?"

Lucas doesn't even know how to articulate how much of a bad idea he thinks forcing the girls to talk would be. Riley had barely been able to talk to him and Mr. Turner earlier for how upset and exhausted she was. How much of that was really going to go away with a single weekend away where the main distraction was her grandparents being in the hospital? You can't have the sort of serious talk needed to mend the fences between Riley and Maya if they're not on even footing. They both need to be able to make themselves heard _and_ understood if they're going to make any progress and Lucas doesn't really see either girl as being prepared to do that (for different reasons) and he has to think if they force things before they're ready it either won't work at all or something will fester between them and they'll all be right back in the same position somewhere down the line.

Either way, it's not an acceptable outcome and he knows it will only hurt both girls more.

"Doing something doesn't mean interfering with their choices." Lucas says, ignoring Zay's comment entirely. "They're not ready to talk. I don't know if you've noticed but Maya hasn't exactly been willing to listen lately."

"I think I got through to her today. She knows she's been unfair."

Lucas raises an eyebrow. "Does she? Because you saw what happened today. Riley can't take another 'discussion' like that."

Farkle genuinely looks annoyed with him and crosses his arms over his chest. "Riley's not the only one hurting because of this fight. The longer this goes on the worse off Maya is. If we don't get them talking and fix all of this soon nothing will ever go back to how it was."

"Right, but you weren't there today when Riley told me she thought she was _broken_ because she couldn't react to things the way she thought was expected. And you weren't there when I had to explain what was going on to make her have a _panic attack_ to Mr. Turner while Riley was crying because she couldn't handle talking about it." Lucas counters quickly. "I want them to stay friends and have things be normal again, but not if it's going to come at her expense.

"I get that you love both of them and that you want them to be happy. So do I. But I never promised to love them the same like you did. Riley is gonna come first for me. Every time. So I will do what I can to repair their friendship because I know that's what she wants, but I'm not gonna do anything that I know has a good chance of hurting her more."

A long silence follows his speech. Lucas regrets it a little, knowing that A) he had probably just violated Riley's trust, telling the two of them about their earlier conversation, B) the last thing he wants to do is provoke a fight with Farkle and arguing so strongly is a good way to do that, and C) he's just been _way_ more open about his feelings for Riley than he has with even her. The longer the quiet goes on, the more he worries, and Lucas opens his mouth to say something more and maybe backtrack a little but Zay claps his hands together before he can get anything out.

"OK, so locking them in a room is out. Who thinks they'd fall for it if we start sending them gifts and sign the cards saying they're from each other?"

* * *

 **Friday**

"Mom, do you have a minute? I have something I want to talk to you about."

Katy Hart nearly drops the glass she's wiping down in shock. Maya—her daughter—actually wants to talk to her about something. It takes every speck of restraint she has not to start jumping up and down and doing her happy dance.

She's known, of course, for weeks that _something_ is wrong, either with Maya herself or at least within her group of friends. Why else would Maya have stopped going over to the Matthews' or the group stopped hanging out together at the bakery? Only that's really all Katy knows. There's no talking to Maya when she doesn't feel like talking, so despite her near daily reminders to her daughter that she's here if she needs anything, Katy never expected in a million years that Maya would actually come to her. The girl is much too independent for that.

"Of course, baby girl." Katy smiles and lowers the glass to the counter. She reminds herself to play it cool. "Just let me tell Denise." Katy ducks out back to the storeroom to let the server currently retrieving more paper for the cash register that she was taking her break, and ditches her apron behind the counter as she returns to the bakery. It's just after the after-school rush, and the bulk of their customers have left in favor of going to get ready for dates and parties and such for the night, so she and Maya take a seat on the sofa facing each other. "What did you want to talk to me about?"

Maya takes a deep breath."Well, I was talking to Miss Kossal today and she said that the camp she was telling me about a few weeks ago, the one she works at in the summers up in the Catskills, still really needs a few junior counselors for this year. And she said she'd be willing to recommend me and get the camp to make me, like, her apprentice or teaching assistant if I can get two other teachers to write me letters of recommendation. I really want to do it, but I figured I should check with you first."

Katy's mouth hangs limply open. It's not exactly the deep heart-to-heart she's been expecting or hoping for. It's also not the sort of request that's typical of her daughter. Maya doesn't ask for a lot anyways (the reality of their financial situation seemed to sink in early despite Katy's best efforts to hide it) but she's still always shown interest in things, even if she would never say she wanted them. She's never shown any excitement over the idea of summer camp or anything like it. She's never been interested in anything that would take her away from the city and Riley.

"It won't cost you anything." Maya continues before Katy can say anything. "The camp's sorta small so they can't pay the junior counselors very much but they don't make them pay for room and board or anything."

"You...want to work at a summer camp in the Catskills."

"Yeah."

"For the whole summer?"

"Eight weeks. I'd have to go up a week after graduation."

"That's barely a month from now."

Maya isn't deterred by the protest in the slightest. It's obvious that she's come to the conversation prepared. "I know it's short notice, but it's a really good opportunity. I'll be earning a little money _and_ I'll get to keep learning from Miss Kossal and working on my art. Plus, she says it's a great, unique first job to have on my resume."

Or her college applications, Katy mentally substitutes, almost certain that that's what Maya's art teacher had really said anyways. And she would be right, which is just one more reason it's almost impossible to say no to her daughter's request. She's brought up some good points, and it's the sort of experience that Katy has just never been able to give her. All of that aside, she just doesn't want to give up her daughter for a whole summer, not when they've actually started to bond a little, and she's not above a little bit of probing to try and see if Maya is completely sold on the idea before she says yes.

"Eight weeks is a really long time. Aren't you going to miss Riley and the guys?" As far as probing for information goes, Katy considers this one of her most subtle attempts.

"I think they'll be OK." Maya says. She twiddles her fingers in her lap. "I kinda messed things up with them. Especially Riley. I'm pretty sure even if I stick around this summer they won't want to see me."

Katy very nearly scoffs, but manages to stop herself. Even though there's been some tension and dynamic changes since the trip to Texas, she can't imagine anything so bad that it would make a sweetheart like Riley freeze anyone out. But Maya is obviously upset and worried about it, and Katy doesn't want to alienate her by dismissing that. "What makes you say that?"

"I kind of...fell for Lucas."

"Oh." That'll do it. Nothing can mess up a friendship quite like matters of the heart. Particularly when two friends start chasing after the same heart. Although last Katy understood… "What about Josh?"

"I don't know...He's never around 'cause he's so busy with senior year. And he only ever looked at me like a little kid...I just started looking at guys around here."

"And your eyes landed on Lucas?"

Maya groans, throwing herself down across Katy's lap. "I know. I'm horrible. I don't even know what happened. It's just..." Katy starts to stroke her hair while she gathers her thoughts. "He's gorgeous and we've always had this game, but it started to feel a lot more like flirting. And then the class voted us best couple in the yearbook even though we weren't actually together, and when I was pretending to be Riley and started talking about him I thought she liked him like a brother and just didn't know it yet."

So naturally she started to think that maybe there was a chance that _that_ relationship wasn't going to work out, Katy fills in. She understands all too well how a brain under the influence of a massive crush can twist every little thing into a sign or a signal. The stories she could tell and the mistakes that she had made when she was in high school…

Of course, Katy also cringes when she realizes the role she might have played in this. In all likelihood, Maya's realization of the "familial nature" of Riley's feelings for Lucas had nothing to do with Riley. Pretending to be someone else can be confusing at the best of times, even when you're an actor who's been doing it for years, and really, Maya and Riley were much too close for any portrayal to be truly accurate and revelatory. Maybe Katy should have been firmer in her warnings when she had been teaching her how to do it in the first place.

"When he didn't ask Riley to the semi-formal, this tiny stupid voice in my head started saying it was because maybe he liked me. And even though I never would have gone out with him as long as Riley still thought she liked him, I started hoping anyways."

"Oh baby, it's never stupid to hope that the guy you like likes you back." Katy soothes. She's never gotten to do this with Maya, but she knows what she wishes people had said to her during her times of heartbreak, and it wasn't giving her a lecture about why she had been wrong.

"Riley figured out I liked him when we were in Texas." Maya continues. "And, typical Riley, she tried to make me happy by lying and saying I was right about the brother thing and trying to get Lucas to go out with me. Only he wasn't interested and he told me that and even though I pretty much knew it was coming it still..."

Katy jumps in. "Hurts? Sucks? Makes you want to throw the guy into the fiery surface of the sun?"

Maya snorts, a brief watery laugh, and she pushes herself off of Katy's lap wiping at her face. "All of the above?"

Katy comforts her daughter, all the while wondering how she had gone from the heartbreak of Lucas not returning her feelings to fighting with Riley; it sounds like Riley had been more than accepting of Maya's feelings, going so far as to lie about her own to give her friend a chance. What middle schooler is generous enough to do that? No one Katy went to school with, that's for sure.

When Katy probes a little, she gets the rest of the story. How being hurt and let down added to how crappy Maya already felt for having feelings for her best friend's sort-of boyfriend, and how she had no idea how to deal with any of it but be mad. And instead of just being mad at herself she got made at Riley because it was easier and because in a way it felt like Riley's fault. _She's the one who convinced me to hope and dream again. She's the one who put my feelings out there and made me get rejected._

Maya tells the story of the month after Texas. How she hasn't been talking to Riley or Lucas, and how she got so caught up in her heartbreak and anger that she didn't pay attention to what was really happening. In her mind, Riley and Lucas were getting together, happy that she was out of the way. They would get to be the perfect couple and could leave her behind. She tells Katy about the most recent fight on Thursday, trying to make amends but being so starkly slapped in the face by a painful reminder to what she thought had been happening, and for once wanting to be the one who did the leaving.

She talks about realizing she made a mistake, but not knowing how to fix it.

"So like I said, I don't think they're going to miss me much." Maya finishes, putting what Katy recognizes as her daughter's game face on once more; the world can't know that she has hurt feelings, after all. "And I'd really rather go to that camp and be doing _something_ then to be stuck here all summer on my own."

Katy sighs. She completely understands what Maya is saying—completely knows the feeling of wanting to avoid the conflict and pain that you know is coming—and as her mother there's a large part of her that wants to support that and let her daughter be happy. But as someone who's gone through it all and knows how little the avoidance tactic actually works, she wants to at least try and get Maya to face the problem. "You're worrying about being left behind by Riley and Lucas, but what if that's not what they want to do? What if they want things fixed just as badly as you do, but when things calm down again and they try, you're not here?" Katy has to believe that _that's_ the reality of the situation. She knows the power of love and heartbreak can distort your perceptions, and the kids that she knows as her daughter's friends would never give up on her or abandon her like she's describing.

Maya doesn't answer her.

"Or, say you go to the camp and you have a great time. When you come back, they'll all still be here. The feelings are still gonna be there. Maybe not your feelings for Lucas, but about what Riley did and what you did...that's not gonna just go away. You can't just run and hide and hope things get better."

"I don't know how to do anything else. Mom, please. I just really need some time away from all this."

"Well..." The protective mother continues to war with the mother who wants to be a teacher and mentor to her daughter. Looking at how tired and devastated Maya looks now, Katy can only see herself reaching one decision. "I want to talk to Miss Kossal before I definitely say yes, but why don't you start thinking about which teachers you might want to ask for those recommendations."

Maya's eyes go wide. "Really?"

"I really think you should at least try to talk to Riley before you go, but yes."

"Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

If Katy had been surprised about Maya coming to her in the first place, that shock has nothing on how she feels now, being bowled over as Maya charges into a hug.

It's definitely worth saying yes for.

* * *

 **Saturday**

The first thing Lucas notices as he wakes up is that he forgot to close his curtains the night before and the sun is really bright as it streams across his face. The second thing he notices is that his phone is ringing loudly enough that it will catch the attention of his parents if he doesn't answer it soon. He reaches over to his bedside table blindly and grabs it, swiping his thumb across the screen as he brings it back to his ear.

"Hello?"

"Can we talk?"

The voice on the other end of the line is smaller and a little more frantic than he's used to, but still instantly recognizable as Riley and it's a bit like a jolt of caffeine to his system. Lucas rubs a hand over his face, to get the grit of sleep out of his eyes. "Of course. Is everything OK?"

"Yeah...No...I don't know. I just...I've been having all these dreams about when I first met Maya and how our friendship used to be and it's really confusing because it's nothing like how things have been lately, you know? And I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing. Almost everyone seems to want me and her to be perfect best friends again, but I'm not sure if that can work after everything that's happened. I don't want to have stop being close with you because it wouldn't be fair to her, and I don't think I can go back to ignoring some of the things she does because I'm worried if I say something it'll be the thing that makes her leave."

Her rambling starts fast and moves up to warp speed quickly. Lucas doesn't have the time to interject.

"When I talked to Mr. Feeny he said that it's OK if I don't want to fix things with Maya, and that it's my choice and nobody else's but I don't know how to make that choice. I don't know how she was able to stand in that hall and look at me and take her ring off and say she was done because even knowing that she did that, I'm still wearing mine and worrying about what she'll think about what happens next, even though it shouldn't matter to me at all because it probably doesn't matter to her. How can something that was so easy for her be so hard for me? And why aren't you saying anything?"

"Well, for one, I'm waiting for you to take a breath." Lucas says. He's gotten used to the speed at which Riley can talk when she gets going, and although his mind is a little slow to catch up since he's only just waking up, he's caught most of what she said. She's starting to realize that what happened wasn't only something that she did and she's at a loss as to what she's supposed to do. Lucas doesn't have a good answer for her, he doesn't even know what she might need to hear, but he's more than a little worried that she's going to work herself up into another panic attack and settles for trying to just slow her down while he tries to figure out what else he can offer. "You know I don't like to interrupt."

"Right. You can take the boy out of Texas but you can't take the Texan manners out of the boy."

Lucas starts to sit up, arranging his pillows to prop himself up better. "Exactly." The edge in her voice is already backing off, so he keeps going down that path. "I'm gonna switch to video chat, OK?"

Riley protests halfheartedly about only just falling out of bed, but ultimately agrees and a few moments later her face, messy hair, bleary eyes and all lights up his phone screen.

"Hi."

"Hey." She's got a hint of blush in her cheeks. "I'm sorry I woke you up just to ramble at you like a crazy person. You could be sleeping right now and instead you're stuck dealing with me."

"You don't need to apologize Riley. I told you to call if you needed anything and obviously you needed to talk about this with someone."

Riley sighs, and reaches up, brushing her hair away from her face. "I just don't know what to do. I love Maya but things have so hard lately. It feels like no matter what I do I'm gonna have to give something up. It's this giant big thing and everyone else is acting like it's so easy and it's just making me feel so stupid. I'm almost in high school. I should be able to figure this out."

"No." Lucas shakes his head. "The only reason anyone is acting like it's easy is because they're not actually dealing with it. You are. It's always easier for someone on the sidelines to act like they're an expert and give their input to the players, but when you're the one in the game there's a lot more pressure on you. You're not stupid because you don't know what you want yet."

"I feel like it should be easier than _this_ though." Her voice cracks and she turns away from her phone's camera.

Lucas can only just see as she wipes her free hand at her eyes. He clenches a fist at his side, wishing that he could find a way to Philly to be there for her. "If I could do it for you I would, but you're the only one who can decide what's right for you."

"But can I? It really doesn't feel like it."

"Riley, if there's one thing I know about you, it's that you can do absolutely anything you put your mind to. You convinced Maya to stop giving up on herself, you helped Miss Burgess keep her job... You made the cheerleading squad when everyone told you not to even try. Even if you have to think about this for weeks I know you'll figure out what you need to do."

"You always know just what to say..." After a long moment Riley turns back to the camera, wiping at her eyes again. She's got a shaky half-smile on. "Promise me, no matter what happens, that we'll go back to how things were?"

Lucas nearly freezes. Does she mean what he thinks she means?

"I don't know what's going to happen with me and Maya, or with me and everyone else after that." Riley continues. "But I know that I can't go back to pretending that you mean less to me than you do. You're really important to me Lucas, and back in Texas you said we could go back to our unofficial thing, moving towards something more. Is that still what you want?"

Now he really wishes he was in Philadelphia with her. This is the sort of promise that he wants to make in person, not over video chat. Not that it's going to stop him. "Riley Matthews, I promise, no matter what happens, whether it's official or unofficial, you're my everything."


	11. Chapter 10

Notes: Just one more chapter after this I think. Things are starting to wrap up.

* * *

"You know, you don't have to go back to the city with your mom tomorrow." Cory says from the doorway of Morgan's bedroom, watching Riley organize all of her things that had ended up in every which place over the long weekend.

"I have school."

"You don't have to go. I'm not." He answers with a shrug.

It might not be very responsible teacher of him to encourage his daughter to miss more school so close to the end of the year (and especially when she's been struggling lately) but the father in him is going to win out on this argument every time. Riley's been becoming a smaller shadow of her usual self over the past few weeks—exhausted, lonely, and quiet—and as a parent it's been so hard for him to watch, unable to do anything and only half understanding what the problem even is while she insists on dealing with it all on her own. Harder still was to get the phone call from Jonathan saying that she had crumbled under the pressure, while he was still a state away and could do nothing to help. And then to listen to the whole story…

Piecing it together from gossip, observations, and semi-coded conversations with Farkle and the other boys had been one thing, but hearing every last detail and harsh interaction from Riley's mouth was another.

It's enough to make him feel like an utter failure as a father. A feeling that only gets worse when Riley barely accepts any comfort from either him or Topanga and he has to divide his time between trying to help her and making sure that everything is getting taken care of with his parents and Josh. His number one job the very second Riley born became guiding her through the world, keeping her safe and happy; it feels like he's achieved absolutely none of his goals and the biggest punch to his gut of all is that she didn't feel like she could come to him.

Cory desperately needs to change that and a real conversation, just the two of them, seems like the best way to do it.

"I think that's the direct opposite of what you're supposed to tell me." Riley says, tucking her science textbook back into her backpack.

"Only as your teacher." Cory steps further into the room. He surveys the area, taking in the mess on the bed where Riley is packing her things and the disaster that is the oversized chair where Morgan's bag appears to have exploded, and opts to take a place in the window seat.

"I'm pretty sure parents aren't supposed to encourage their kids to skip school either."

"I'm just saying that between me and your Uncle Jon, we have enough pull to let you do the rest of the year home-school style. Give yourself a little time to focus on getting back to where you want to be, let all the drama die down...take a break and get a fresh start in the fall."

Riley spins around, another book in her hand. Her eyes narrow ever so slightly at him, and it becomes so clear to him in that moment that she's inherited more than just her mother's hair; just like Topanga, she may be tired or upset or any other number of things but she will not be handled. "I'm not worried about going back to school, Dad."

"You're not?"

She shakes her head. "Lucas says that once they got the cheerleaders and Dave to start explaining that what happened was kind of serious everyone kind of calmed down about it. I don't think it'll be that bad."

Lucas. Of course that's who she's been talking with. A part of Cory's heart clenches a little at the thought of the looming romantic entanglement for his daughter (the only two outcomes he can see for them are mutual miserable pining while they try to respect everyone else's feelings or actually dating in some fashion and either way means Riley is growing up and headed for a lot more of those dreaded _feelings_ ), but in his opinion he manages to push that back and school his reaction well, keeping his tone light. "Lucas says, huh?"

"I trust him a lot, Dad." Riley tosses her book down and crosses over to the window seat, sitting down next to him. "I think all of this would have been a lot worse if he hadn't been there for me."

Then thank God for Lucas. Cory doesn't even want to think about what worse would look like. Things are hard enough now. He loops his arm around Riley's shoulder and she leans her head against his chest. "He's a good kid."

"I know." A long pause passes. "I can't give him up."

"What?" It's not exactly what Cory expects to hear. Why would Riley think anyone wants her to?

"I know everyone thinks I should fix things with Maya and go back to the way things were, but...I don't know if that's what I want."

The confession is flooring. Riley and Maya were the next him and Shawn. That sort of friendship doesn't just end. And if Riley seriously has that many doubts about the relationship, how is she so devastated by what had happened on Thursday? Cory knows the girls have been having their problems. Long before Lucas had become an issue their relationship had started having growing pains; there were new boundaries to learn as they got older and both girls seemed to be having trouble adjusting to personality changes and how to support each other in new ventures that didn't involve the others. He and Topanga and to some extent Katy have been preparing for a fight that they would have to deal with. But he never thought it would actually lead to anything ending.

Riley quietly continues to talk. "I've been thinking about it a lot. I love Maya, but she hasn't been a good friend lately. Friends don't act like it's a hardship to deal with someone because of their personality. Not as anything more than an obvious joke. And I don't think friends refuse to listen to each other, or expect one another to give up something that's important to them."

"You've been as close as sisters ever since you met."

"It really hurts that she wouldn't even talk to me, Dad. I've tried to apologize, I've tried to do what she seems to want and put some distance between me and Lucas...Nothing's been good enough...And then with what happened on Thursday..." Riley's voice breaks and it takes everything Cory has to not follow suit. He settles for squeezing her close and rubbing his hand gently on her arm. "If she wants to apologize and really make an effort then I don't think I have it in me to turn her away but...I can't be the only one trying anymore. And I'm not going to give up someone who's really important to me and has been more steady and supportive than anyone else just to keep her."

It takes a moment for Cory to wrap his head around it all. He and Shawn had their share of fights, but never like this. It was never about a girl; neither ever expected the other to be someone other than who they were, or anything else that Riley has been describing. He doesn't know what he would have done if anything similar had happened and the choice came down to Topanga or Shawn. He didn't even realize it was a decision that his daughter was considering.

A part of him is terrified. She's growing up. She's choosing the boy over her best friend.

A bigger part of him is proud. She's growing up. She's choosing herself over any of them.

* * *

Lucas walks into school on Monday morning unsure of what to expect.

Farkle and Zay accepted his declaration that Riley was going to come first for him and that he would only participate in plans that aligned with her interests and wants, but their idea of respecting that appears to be keeping him out of whatever their strategy might be. He knows they still want to get the girls talking again and hopefully repair the dynamic for the whole group and that they've been trying to figure out how to do that all weekend but he has no idea what they have planned or if they've been talking to Maya or Riley or anyone else. The only thing Lucas is certain of is that they had no intention of giving up.

There's no way to know if Maya feels the same as last week or if she's realized how irrational and cruel she's being. He can't predict how she'll react when she sees him or Riley or even more so him _and_ Riley. ( _He's_ not even sure what's going to happen when he sees Riley thanks to their more recent talks and declarations so how can he begin to anticipate what everyone else is going to think or do?)

What worries him most is that he can't predict how Riley will react when she sees Maya. Lucas knows she's nervous about it, has spent hours wondering what to do and what will happen over the weekend. At their last conversation late the night before, she seemed confident that she had found a good compromise and was ready to deal with it all, but he can't help but feel unsettled about the whole thing. He's been there, having a plan to deal with a potential confrontation that you're certain will work until you're actually face to face with it. Then the plan flies out the window and with it, your control.

If they need anything right now it's a little control and order.

Everything's weighing on his mind as he walks to his locker to the point where Lucas is completely startled when Zay slings an arm across his shoulder. "Lucas, my man. You know for someone whose only homework this weekend was to 'study' and get ready for exams you sure look like a guy who spent the whole time writing lab reports for Mr. Norton. Everything OK?"

Lucas blinks. Has Zay completely forgotten the ongoing mess? "Yeah, man, I've just been taking the end of _American Voice Talent Star Search_ really hard." When Zay completely misses his sarcasm, Lucas rolls his eyes.

"Dude, I know. That was rough." Zay nods sagely. "They picked the completely wrong winner. It was the last season ever and they pick a girl who can't even get through a song without messing up the words or completely missing the power note. It's an insult to the legacy of the show. Not gonna lie though, when all the past winners came out to sing the final tribute song...things got a little misty in the Babineaux household."

"And when the judges talked about how they—are you crazy Zay I don't care about that stupid show!" Lucas pushes away from his friend. "I'm worried about what's gonna happen with Riley and Maya."

"Luke, I know you were totally against the whole, interfering with the their relationship thing, but Farkle and I figured it all out. We have a grade A, guaranteed to work plan—that we didn't even take from a TV show—and Farkle is putting things into motion as we speak. By the end of the day Riley and Maya are going to be best friends again and you'll be back to being the ambiguously older and unrealistically attractive friend that has a poorly defined relationship with the both of them."

Lucas is going to interrogate Zay about this supposedly excellent plan, or at least protest that his relationship with either girl has always been entirely defined in it's own way, but they reach their bank of lockers before he completely forms the thought and Riley is leaning against them. There's color in her cheeks and a spark of life in her eyes that hasn't been there for weeks and Lucas can't help but be thrilled. She's still clearly exhausted (it's kind of a dead giveaway that she's tired and fairly done with things if she wears her hair up in a simple ponytail) but that she's there at all and genuinely smiling for him is enough that the rest of it flies out the window in irrelevance.

"Hi." She waves briefly, rocking on her heels and glancing at the floor when she notices the interest Zay is watching the exchange with.

Lucas scratches behind his ear, unable to hold his own smile back. "Hey. I'm really glad your grandparents are gonna be OK."

"Thanks." Riley nods, brushing a non-existent strand of hair behind her ear. "And thanks for spending so much time on the phone with me."

"Or maybe you're headed towards a completely different outcome." Zay's eyes dart between the pair during the extended, blissfully awkward silence. "And a totally defined relationship with Riley. I thought you guys were staying friends to respect Maya's feelings."

"We were. It wasn't working."

"And now neither will the plan!"

Riley's eyes widen and her breath catches. "Plan? What plan?"

Zay already has his phone out, thumbs rapidly flying. He gets a message sent off before he answers Riley. "Doesn't matter, Sugar. I just told Farkle to abort the mission. Nothing's gonna happen."

"But something _was_ going to happen?"

"Just a little plan to get you and Maya talking again." Zay shrugs. "But with this new development in play I think that-"

An announcement over the school's intercom interrupts. " _Riley Matthews and Maya Hart, please join the rest of the school ambassadors in the main office. You'll be departing in five minutes. Riley Matthews and Maya Hart, please join the school ambassadors in the main office."_

Lucas and Riley, who most definitely had not signed up to be a school ambassador and go talk to rising sixth graders about what things are like at John Quincy Adams, both turn to stare at Zay. Riley's eyes are just as wide as he's ever seen, but Lucas knows that his own gaze must feature more incredulity and anger than shock because Zay swallows and holds up a hand before he says anything.

"I think that my message did not get to Farkle in time. And knowing your feelings on the subject, I think I will get going to my homeroom." He flees quickly.

Lucas is considering if it's worth following him to get the details of what's supposed to happen next when Riley's hand slips into his, her palm slightly clammy. He forgets going after Zay and turns back to face her, taking in her returned pallor and slightly shallow breathing. Wary of her having another panic attack (he has absolutely no idea if that was a one time thing or something more) he rushes to think of something that will reassure her. "Riley, whatever they did, you won't have to deal with it. You didn't sign up to be a school ambassador, the school's not just gonna send you to talk to elementary school kids when you weren't planning on it. This'll straighten out in two minutes tops." He manages a few more soothing words before Riley shakes her head.

The shock seems to slip off her face, replaced by a flat, pressed lip. "No. It's OK. It'll be fine."

"You don't have to-,"

"Lucas, the longer I put it off the scarier it's going to seem." She shakes her head, the resignation in her voice betraying the exhaustion that had earlier appeared so hidden. "And it's...kind of terrifying now so I don't really want to see it get worse. Besides… we might not even be partnered up to go to the same school."

He's pretty sure that whatever Farkle did was thorough enough to ensure that that's not the case, but he can't bring himself to extinguish any hope that she's found. "Are you sure?"

"No."

"Then we'll go and tell them-,"

"But I have to do it anyway." Riley interrupts. "Walk me to the office?"

If he can't talk her out of it, the only thing he can do is support her. Lucas squeezes her hand and musters up a smile. "Of course."

* * *

"Farkle and Zay sure are dedicated." Riley says quietly as Maya sits next to her in the back of the school van, the last available seat among the other student ambassadors. She had indeed been partnered with Maya to go visit all of the rising sixth graders at their alma mater, Benjamin Franklin Elementary, but when they weren't dealing with the students every moment had been silent and awkward, even lunch. She's fairly certain that she caught Maya watching her once or twice with her mouth open to say something but despite the time spent worrying over what that something might be, nothing ever came of it. Riley's spent just as much of her day wondering what was going to come of the scheme as she has teaching kids what to expect as they get to middle school and now that they're on their way back to JQA, she just wants the wondering to be over and done with.

It's like she told Lucas: the longer the wait goes on, the worse the anticipation gets.

"Getting us added to the list of ambassadors, making sure we got partnered together, forging our parents' signatures on the travel permission slips..." Riley lists off. "They must really want us to talk."

Maya buckles her seat belt. "They only did all that for you." She admits as the van driver eases out into the heavy mid-afternoon traffic. "I asked to do this last minute on Friday. I want to work at this camp over the summer and I figure every little thing to stick on my application would help. And when I told Farkle about it he got excited saying it was the perfect opportunity…He really believes in our friendship."

 _That's what I thought about you._ Riley bites back the reply. She didn't decide to write Maya off or be angry, she decided to hear her out and go from there. A moment later the rest of Maya's words hit her. "You're going away this summer?"

"Hopefully...I'll get to work on my art if I get accepted and...I think I really need the time away from everything to get my head on straight again."

Wait, what? Why would Maya need to get her head on straight? Hasn't she known exactly what she's wanted this whole time? That's what caused all this trouble to start with.

"Riley, I owe you an explanation."

Riley's heart sinks. An explanation. Not an apology.

She knows what she's said to her dad and Lucas. That she's not going to keep putting Maya first or letting her dictate the terms of their friendship if Maya keeps leaving everything feeling so unbalanced. Which was all well and good in theory but now that she's here, talking to Maya and it's starting to sound like Maya still doesn't get it, Riley is realizing that she was still so hopeful that things would work out and Maya would come around. A hope that had only gotten bigger when their conversation had started so civilly just now. And the hope turns into a heavy rock, crashing onto her chest that makes it almost impossible to focus on what Maya is saying now.

"I never should have fallen for Lucas." Maya won't even look at her. "Part of the reason I like Josh so much is because it's never gonna happen. I mean, there's a whole bunch of other things, but I let myself get attached to the idea because of that. I don't have any hopes to get crushed when he says no because I know it'll never be a yes. What eighteen-year-old would actually give his niece's friend the time of day? They wouldn't. So I get to fall in love and never get my heart broken."

Riley's still figuring out love herself, but she's fairly certain that's not how it works. To her it still sounds like Maya was just torturing herself. Why would you purposefully fall for someone that you know you can't have?

"But then you come along and do your fix-it thing on me. It wasn't good enough for you that I had figured out a way to deal with my life." Maya looks up, her lips twisted into a bittersweet smirk. "You wanted me to hope for things and want more. You gave me more to make me _need_ more."

"I gave you more…?"

"You...were my friend and sister and were always so good to me. You shared everything you had with me, right down to your family. You introduced me to Shawn and you helped me save art class and you made me realize I was settling for everything and suddenly things weren't good enough anymore. I started wanting things again...really wanting them, and thinking that maybe, just maybe I could get them.

"Like, I saw you and Lucas and the way he treated you and I didn't want to sit around dreaming about a guy I was never gonna get anymore. I wanted to find what you had."

Riley's mouth just won't work. She wants to ask why Maya would have fallen for Lucas when she was noticing him because of how he was treating _her_ , her supposed best friend and sister. She wants to ask how any of this makes it her fault that Lucas didn't want to go out with her or makes her deserving of these past few weeks. But nothing comes out.

"I couldn't handle what happened in Texas because...thanks to you I had forgotten how much it hurts when you lose something that you're hoping for." Maya continues. Riley realizes she might get one of her questions answered even if she can't ask it."There was a part of me that honestly thought it could all work out and when he said it had always been you...it was like that part of me was getting ripped out of my chest. It hurt _so_ much and all I could think was that I wouldn't be in that pain if you hadn't made me want and hope for things again. I was fine the way things were but _you_ convinced me to start dreaming again and—and you stacked the deck to give me all these things and make me think that things could work out. I forgot how to be hard and heartless and I was...so unprepared for the 'no' and I...I hated you for all of it."

 _I hated you_ _for all of it._

The words spin around in her mind, echoing deeply. She made her best friend hate her. Just by trying to be a good friend. It's only the biting pinch of her fingernails digging into her thighs that brings Riley back into the present with a small voice in the back of her head whispering that that's crap.

It's not her fault that Maya didn't get what she wanted. Yes, Riley tried hard to make her friend want more for herself, because she couldn't fathom a life without any sort of hope and she knew how much potential there was in Maya, but after one or two mistakes when she was younger she never told Maya _what_ to hope for. And yes, she worked to try and help Maya make her dreams come true but she had never intended to give Maya any sort of false impressions.

You can hope for things all you want. You can't control what you get and what you don't. It just so happened that some of the first things Maya tried hoping for were things that worked out.

Riley's suddenly thankful that her emotions still feel strangely unbalanced and they aren't consistently forthcoming yet, because if they were she knows her response would be too loud and catch the attention of the rest of the occupants of the bus, who, let's face it, were probably listening in anyways.

"Maya, all I ever wanted was for you to be happy."

"Yeah. And for a while there you did way too good a job of it." Maya reaches up and thumbs at the tears near her eyes. "I know it's wrong and doesn't make any sense, but it was _so_ much easier to be mad at you for teaching me to dream for things again than it was to be mad at myself for dreaming of the wrong things."

"So…" Riley's still not sure if she understands what's being said or if this is supposed to be the part where she says everything's OK. She knows it's not OK (for all the words Maya's said she hasn't heard a single apology, just a bunch of explanations) but if this is the moment where she's supposed to say it is, the part of her that started to panic at the beginning of the conversation really wants her to. She talked a big game with her dad but she's not ready for this to be the end of Peaches and Honey. The other part of her that's still got some anger of her own, stops her from doing it. "You just...get to hate me for trying to let you be happy and give you what you wanted? Because as far as I can tell, the only thing I actually did that was wrong was telling Lucas about your feelings without talking to you, and I've apologized for that. But you..."

Maya leans her head back against the car seat, screwing her eyes shut and pressing her lips together. "I know." She sighs. When she opens her eyes again she doesn't bother to hide the tears welling in them. "I said a lot of horrible things and I did things that I shouldn't have to—to try and make myself feel better about the whole thing. And I've been thinking about it a lot because it really doesn't make sense. You've always been the person to make me feel better when I'm upset, so why would I push you away now?"

It's a good question.

"But, I realized that you're an amazing person. You're so much better than me and you always have been. That's why Lucas picked you. I just thought...with Lucas pointing it all out you were gonna come to your senses and realize you could have a better best friend than me. And I thought it would hurt less if I did the leaving. So I made myself stay angry and pushed you away.

"And you didn't deserve that. You didn't deserve any of it." Maya breaks off, and turns away, drawing her hand to her face.

Riley knows that Maya is doing everything she can to keep herself from crying; the last thing Maya would want to do is show weakness-especially in front of so many other people. Riley feels herself softening. She still doesn't understand half of Maya's choices, but she's known for a long time that Maya's ultimate goal is protecting herself. So of course when she was feeling hurt and threatened by Lucas' rejection she would do everything she could to rebuild her walls as quickly as possible.

And Riley does at least understand the fear of losing someone who you've grown so close to. After a moment's hesitation, Riley reaches over and rests her hand on Maya's knee. "Maya-,"

"Please don't." Maya jerks her knee away. "I feel crappy enough without you being perfect and understanding about how horrible I was."

The annoyance that swells in Riley is almost surprising. She had come to the talk _prepared_ for things to be over, not resigned to it. How dare Maya act like this is a break up. And furthermore how dare she act like she can simultaneously be the person causing the break up and the wounded party. "Yeah. You were a jerk." She bites off. "You were cruel and mean when you had no reason to be. I _never_ did anything with the intention of hurting you and that you couldn't even bring yourself to remember that and trust me sucks. But you just explained that you didn't just do it on a whim. You were hurt and trying to protect yourself. You did it the wrong way. That doesn't mean you deserve for people to stop caring about you now."

Maya's wiping at her tears again but she freezes at Riley's words and drops her hand, turning slowly. "How can you possibly still care about me after all this?"

"Because," Riley says, "we've been best friends for nearly six years. I don't know how to just stop caring about someone who's been in my life for that long."

"Does that mean we can still be friends?"

"I don't know." Admitting it leads to the first small bit of weight edging back from Riley's being. After everything Maya said, she finally feels like she doesn't have to hold back her feelings. Like honesty is a thing that they can actually do now and whatever happens because of it, it will be the right thing. It's the lightest she's felt in an incredibly long time. "Maya, you know that for a long time I thought our friendship had an expiration date. You're cool and tough and I'm a gentle goof and it didn't make sense that we could work. But it did, and you promised me you'd stay and that we were sisters and that nothing was ever going to change that and I believed you. So when you did all that...when you stopped trusting me and talking to me...when you took your ring off it was like you were telling me that all of those years didn't matter and you never meant any of it.

"I love you but I can't go through that again. And I can't expect you to put yourself through something that's going to hurt you either."

"What do you mean?"

Riley knows that this is the part that could turn the conversation on his head. Maya could go right back to being angry, and for that reason she hesitates before she answers."My feelings for Lucas and his feelings for me haven't gone away."

She can see the moment the realization dawns on Maya. Maya looks down at her lap soon after. "You're gonna start dating."

"Yeah."

"Fair enough." She sighs. "I never should have gotten in the way. You're just...putting everything back the way it's supposed to be."

"We're not doing it to hurt you." Riley tries to put her hand on Maya's knee again. This time Maya doesn't pull away. "We just don't want to hurt ourselves anymore. But if it's gonna be too hard for you..."

Maya shakes her head. There's a spark in her eyes that Riley hasn't seen in a long time; the kind of determined fire that means her friend has decided on making something happen. "No. My feelings aren't gonna be your problem anymore. I'm gonna go away for the summer and get my head on straight and hopefully when I come back Lucas won't be anything to me but some Huckleberry dating the best girl in the city."

It's the first time Riley's really felt like she's talking to her friend again instead of a familiar-looking stranger. Her mouth ticks up into a smile before she can stop it. "Maybe this summer can be a fresh start for all of us. We all take a step back, let things get a little clearer again and when school starts again we'll all know exactly what we want."

"I'd like that." Maya holds up a pinkie finger. "To fresh starts with old friends?"

Riley locks her pinkie around Maya's. "To fresh starts with old friends."


	12. Epilogue

Notes: This is it. The final little epilogue of Don't Stop Here. This fic has been quite a journey for me, changing a lot from what I originally pictured when I first decided to write Lucas firmly not accepting the brother concept in Texas but it was a journey I was happy to go on. Many thanks to everyone who shared, favorited, or commented on the story—I love every one of you so much.

* * *

The night of the Spring Fling, only four days after her heart to heart with Maya, Riley finds herself in the gymnasium making last minute adjustments to the decorations. She doesn't have to be—the entire dance committee worked together after school to transform the room hanging brightly colored netting with twinkle lights and releasing balloons among other things—but the idea of doing anything else leaves her feeling vaguely unsettled and nervous.

The hours before previous dances have always involved modeling outfits in her room with Maya, primping and dancing around to ridiculously cheesy, fun music. And while they're talking again, sitting with each other at lunch and otherwise reintroducing each other back into their lives, that's really all they've been doing. Reintroducing. Everything is still quiet and awkward. Half the time nobody knows what to say for fear of reigniting the tensions and in general there seems to be a cloud of whispers and pointing glances that seems to follow the group.

The entire school had witnessed the breakdown of the relationship and now they're just as eager to watch it's reconstruction.

There's also still some very weird energy between Maya and Lucas and Riley's not sure if it's because Maya still likes him or because Lucas isn't very good at hiding that he's less trusting after everything that's happened or something else entirely. She just knows that she can't say anything and already she's caught in the middle once more; she's not going to go back on what she wants (and what she's told everyone) and back away from the budding relationship with Lucas but she also doesn't want to rub it in Maya's face.

The easiest solution that Riley can come up with is to continue keeping things mostly separate until Maya leaves for her summer camp. It's not overly hard. She's really busy trying to get back on track academically now that the rest of her life's not all over the place and even though Jenkins and the other dance committee members have been very understanding and attempted to excuse her from the remaining preparation work Riley hadn't wanted to abandon them so close to the big day so that was another time commitment that made things a bit simpler. Factor in that her parents are still feeling guilty for letting the situation build as much as it and compensating by holding family meetings and activities every night (her dad had come back in the middle of the week having confirmed that his parents would be all right and worked out a schedule with Aunt Morgan and Uncle Eric as to how they'd deal with everything in the summer months) and Riley has easily been occupied enough that nobody's schedule totally lines up. She's mostly been spending time with one or two friends at once.

It's almost like before the big discussion only the oppressive cloud of doom and sadness isn't hanging over them anymore so it's not so scary.

So to keep that going and avoid anymore drama, Riley finds herself getting ready for the dance early on her own and making sure that everything in the gymnasium is perfect. She puts some music on her phone and works meticulously, moving from corner to corner to ensure that every last decoration is in the right place and will stay there. Her work keeps her occupied enough that she doesn't even notice anyone else approaching until they're standing on the opposite side of the candy buffet she's arranging.

"Is that very important candy placement you're working on or can I interrupt?"

The warm smile in the voice is enough to make Riley grin even before she looks up. "Lucas! What are you doing here? Shouldn't you be getting ready?"She knows it's a stupid question even before all of the words come out. He's standing in front of her wearing gray suit pants and a vest over a pale blue shirt. Of course he's ready. And with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows it takes Riley an extra moment to get past any other thought than _he's gorgeous_.

"I know we agreed that we're all just going to this as friends," they entire group had agreed no dates (with the exception of Isadora) as a compromise and part of welcoming Maya fully back into the fold, "but since this is the first dance where we're really on the same page about what we are, I wanted to stop by your place so we could still do something a little special. But your parents told me you came here early to finish setting up."

"So here you are."

"Here I am." Lucas steps around the table to join her on the same side. Standing in front of her he takes a moment, staring, before his smile seems to grow both softer and bigger in a way that Riley can't begin to understand. "You look amazing."

Riley glances down at the chambray shirt she had buttoned over her dress to protect the floral patterned fabric from any number of certainly inevitable accidents while she worked and thinks of her hair that she has plans to style but hasn't even taken out of a messy bun yet and she blushes, glancing down at the floor. "I'm not even ready yet."

"You look amazing." He repeats. He reaches over and moves a strand of hair away from her face. They stay frozen briefly before a spark of warmth seems to jolt from his fingertip and they both jump half a step back. Lucas chuckles quietly and starts to fumble his hand into his pocket. "I, uh...I got you something."

"You didn't have to do that." Her eyes widen when he removes what is so obviously a jewelry box. They aren't really at the point where they're giving each other gifts, are they? They've barely been on a handful of dates and those were all before they ever even went to Texas. And jewelry seems like the sort of thing you should really only be giving to your official girlfriend, which she's definitely not yet. "I mean, I don't have anything for you..."

Lucas hands her the box. "Just save me a dance."

Inside the box Riley finds a delicate silver bracelet with a single white and yellow daisy charm connecting the pieces of chain. "It's beautiful, Lucas."

"Here, let me help you put it on." Lucas takes the bracelet and the hand that she offers. He gets the bracelet on after only a moment's struggle with the clasp. "There. _Now_ you're ready for the dance."

"Well I don't know about that..." Riley looks up from admiring the bracelet. She's had her fill of looking less than put together in front of her classmates in the past few weeks, and in particular she wants to look nice at this, the last dance before she enters high school. Lucas is still staring at her and smiling in the way that's enough to make her feel like a beauty on par with Maya or any of the other girls in school. There's a rush of confidence and an idea pops into her head that she just can't ignore. "But I am ready for a dance with you." Riley grabs her phone from the table and changes the song. A bouncy pop song shifts to something softer, more acoustic. She turns back to face him, smiling and holding out her hand.

Lucas' smile grows. He grabs her hand, gently tugs and twirls so she spins in a whirl as she's pulled in, stopping when she collides with his chest. They both laugh and start to sway with the music. Lucas moves his hands down to her waist; Riley curls her arms around his neck.

They dance together, inching closer with the gentle lyrics of the song until Riley is able to rest her head on Lucas' shoulder.

This is it. The warmth and security. The support and caring that she's been longing to take part in, that she's known would be so nice if she could only enjoy it but has been holding herself back from. Riley wants to memorize every inch of this moment if only because it feels so perfect. They've danced together before, but never like this. Never when they were so close or comfortable, when it feels like even if the gymnasium were to flood with students in the next few seconds, they would still be the only two people in the world that mattered.

The feelings that had scared her so much since long before Texas are still there, towering over her and leaving her in a shadow that makes her feel impossibly small, but there's something else there too. A steady presence by her side.

Riley knows without question that in Lucas she has someone who is going on the journey with her, not dragging her along.

"I'm glad you can't turn off feelings." She announces at a break in the vocals of the music.

"You are?"

Riley nods. "Back in Texas, all I wanted was to be able to stop feeling so strongly for you. Not because I didn't like you but because...I never wanted it to hurt. I was too afraid of everything bad that could happen that I couldn't even let myself imagine everything good.

"But you….fought for me in the most understanding way. And you stood by and let me learn so much more about how to trust and rely on someone. I never would have gotten any of that if I had been able to stop caring. I never would have gotten this beautiful moment. So thank you for fighting for me."

"Thank you."

Riley's brow furrows a little. "I didn't do anything. What are you thanking me for?"

"For letting me fight for you." Lucas moves a hand from her waist to gently cup her cheek and as the music swells behind them, draws her up into a kiss.


End file.
